Abashed, Banal, Bromidic

” We’ve all done it at some point. Sitting at the back of the classroom, our attention span fully exhausted and our will to live somewhat sapping. All of a sudden the paper clip in front of you seems awfully interesting. Now, I don’t proclaim to be an expert on the uses of paper clips but I do know that unraveling the seemingly perfect form is a fantastic way to waste 30 seconds of otherwise unproductive time. Unfortunately I feel as though I have become that paper clip. And I’m sure you also know that re-forming an unraveled paper clip is impossible. I’m hoping I’ve not reached that situation.

So I guess I should explain my feelings and the reasons for them. I’m extremely sorry but I’m going to have to use the C word. Change. Yep, I expect this word is getting quite cocky with its dominant position in my tag cloud but it really is one of the major driving forces in my life en ce moment. The dynamics of my life have shifted and I’m now in a strange position – I’m adapting in a way which I feel like I can control. “

Ok, that’s what I started with. Re-reading it it just sounds pretentious, nonsensical and plain crap. So I’ll try a more concise route to my point (if and when I ever decide upon one.)

Basically the changes in my life have stopped and I’m now in the situation where I can finally take stock and try to decide what path to take. My emotions and feelings have sort of toned themselves down and I now feel like I can enjoy what I have at the moment, in the moment. I’m pretty confident that I’ve judged the situations around me relatively well and I can see the ways things are heading. There are bits I’m not going to enjoy but equally things on the whole are looking up.

I seem to have lost all inspiration with regards to this blog and I genuinely don’t know what to write here anymore. You can see that my last post was a week ago so obviously procrastination is starting to have its wicked way with me. I think, as a result, that a change in direction is in order. My next post may well be something very different to my usual ramblings on about various thoughts, alternatively it could just never appear.

Recently I’ve been writing a piece about a boy in secondary school, I may even type a little bit up for a change. Though I’d risk boring those of you who ever read this to death.

Sorry this has been genuinely crap. I’m sorry that you’ll inevitably feel that some of your time has been wasted. It you really want to make up for it and do something productive try bending a paper clip into a straight line!

Wow, that sure was an horrific ending.

Hm, Sorry.

I have no idea whatsoever.

“How are you?” Yes it’s a simple question, and I expect we all get asked it at least 5 times a day. My usual answer is either “I’m fine” (or “I’m well”) “thank you.” But today I was asked that very question and for some bizarre reason was unable to formulate a comprehensible answer.

“Hey! How are you?” Usually I answer without thinking about it or even sometimes, if I’m really preoccupied, without letting the person finish the question. But this morning not only did I listen to the question, I considered what it was actually asking. How am I?

Well, physically I’m well – I’m alive, suffering from sporadic bouts of (man) flu, but none the worse for it. Not particularly (or remotely) fit and not at all in shape, but that’s the norm. So yeh, I’m fine.

But then there’s the flip side. Mentally I’m exhausted. Not worn down, or under the weather, but exhausted. Ok, so now I sound melodramatic and I guess I probably am being, I’m in one of those ridiculously apathetic stupors that tend to tryannise adolescence, and then spill into later life. But at the moment I’m in a tunnel where there is no light at the end. Just random air vents allowing momentary glimmers of hope in an otherwise mono-directional batch process life.

By which I’m referring mainly to school (well it’s college but it still feels like school.) I’m two terms into my A-levels and don’t mind admitting that I’m finding it pretty hard going. My subject choices, although they are based on my interests, were perhaps too ambitious and in such respects even naïve. Quite how I expected to prosper I have no idea. Although, in some courses at least, the first terms are apparently the hardest so there’s an air vent.

And another factor of late is that (in case you missed it) it’s coming up to Christmas. Now usually I’d be the big kid and be mega excited usw. But this year I’m dreading it. Unfortunately my father is the personification of sordid and in the past couple of months has left my mother, and the family to swan off and do as he pleases. All very well and dandy, I can’t say we ever got on anyway. But unfortunately (perhaps unfortunately is the wrong word) my mum still loves him etc. So Christmas, a time for all the family, is gonna constitute of awkward silences and generic words of thanks. Lovely!

And I know that I’m lucky to have what I have, and I know that [Oh for fuck sake! - If i get another bastard e-mail from ipoints I'm going to kill something!] there are millions of people who are infinitely worse off than I am, but that doesn’t make me feel any better. And I’m sorry that I’m taking such a selfish, self-centered and bigoted view of the situation but I’m still looking for a light.

So I can’t really call this a post can I. (Was deliberating a ! or a ? for the end of that sentence, couldn’t decide so ended with a .) So I shall class this as a rant post. Not made for good reading, not particularly insightful and definately not uplifting!

Allow me to apologise (again) for the languishing nature of the past couple of posts. I shall keep trying to think happy thoughts!

Oh, and the picture (by the way) is just something I found online which doesn’t have particular relevance to any of the aforementioned but I thought it went well with the clueless theme. Being as I have no idea what to make of it!

Procrastination does not make a good friend.

Well, firstly allow me to apologise for the 2 days in between this and the previous post. Now, I could say that I’ve been mightily busy or over-worked etc. Whereas, the truth is that I hadn’t a clue what I was going to write in my next post so I put it off. Convincing myself that this would just be a week-nights weblog and that nobody would read it regardless of when I wrote the next entry. To a certain extent I was right.

Procrastination: the deferment or avoidance of an action or task to a later time and is often linked to perfectionism.
(I must state at this point that procrastination in my case is more due to laziness than perfectionism! And also that finding relevant images for procrastination is near impossible.)

There are times in our lives when the inevitable and the desirable are worlds apart. Times when we would give anything to be somewhere else, doing something different. And occasionally during these times we manage to get our own way. We fake illness, we run away, or (more commonly) we simply put off the undesirable until later.

This, unfortunately, is common in my life. I tend to lack motivation for anything that does not enthrall me or benefit me directly and instantly. I am, in this respect, very much like a chinchilla. I lack foresight and have excess cheek space. I find it hard to sit down and do something, for example, if the deadline is weeks, or even days, away. With college work I guess that some putting-off is inevitable and normal. But In my case the things I do instead of work are frankly pathetic.

History essay on the topic of “The Role Of The Girondins In The French Revolution” vs. Gears Of War on Xbox 360. Now, if I were a committed student there would be no choice, but alas I am not. Not only am I lacking motivation, but my choice of replacement activity has absolutely no utility whatsoever! So is there a difference between putting-off work do do something worthwhile (by which I am not referring to Xbox) and putting off work for the simple reason of not wanting to do work?

Yes. Procrastination for procrastination’s sake (or for the sake of anything less worthwhile than the original task) is laziness. Putting off a history assignment to save the lives of orphans in a developing country, for example, is less procrastinating, and more prioritising for the greater good. So I have now found my excuse to put off doing things I don’t want (or am simply too idle) to do. I’m doing something for the greater good.

Unfortunately this is the heart of my problem. Instead of cracking on with the task in hand I spend more thinking up excuses and justifying it to myself. It wasn’t uncommon for me in my earlier years of high school to not do a piece of homework, but then spend hours that evening thinking of a waterproof excuse to give the teacher for not having done it. Estimated time doing work would take – 30 minutes. Time taken thinking about work having not done it – 2 hours. And even though the numbers didn’t add up eventually this became routine. I’m now so practiced at convincing myself that things can wait that I, at times, find it impossible to motivate myself.

And would you look at that, I’ve entered a loop! The more I procrastinate the more it becomes acceptable. The more acceptable it becomes the more I procrastinate! So how do I break the loop? That’s not a rhetorical question, I genuinely don’t know.

Having read all of that through I’ve realised that I haven’t really made a point, and I haven’t even made it interesting. I guess for me the fact that I actually wrote anything is significant. I tend to set up this sort of account, write one post then leave it alone for…well, forever.

So I’m sorry this is a crap post. I shall endeavor to have some interesting thoughts tomorrow. And I shall try to write every evening this week! Possibly with the exception of Thursday which will be the last day of school. (ok, that was added on Thursday evening – really not in a writing frame of mind. Sorry!)

Sorry again!