Procrastination

I have always been a procrastinator.   When I say "always" I mean that in the most literal of terms.  My mother carried me 10 months before she gave up and had me removed, somewhat like an obnoxious tumor, which only became more annoying once it was freed.

Nevertheless, this is not about how much I annoy my mother, although I'm sure my procrastination has often been a source of annoyance to her.  This is, in fact, about regret.

I am notorious about procrastinating, and completely unapologetic about it normally.  I generally do, eventually, get around to doing things, and I generally do my very best with them.  But occasionally, something goes awry.

Take last night, for instance.  

I've been enrolled in 2 classes through Capella University for the last 10 weeks, which post all assignments and expectations on the internet before the class even starts.  So you would think that at some point, something in my brain would have registered important things like final papers due, and so forth.  Well, it didn't happen.  

Throughout the ten week period, these two courses (which were both taught by the same professor - no complaints there, best professor I've had from Capella so far) had a schedule which resulted in weekly assignments being due at midnight on Sunday night, at the end of each unit.  So, each week, I would make a point of hitting at least one of the discussion board questions by Wednesday (so I didn't look like a complete slacker), and then everything else would wait at least until Saturday (if it was a really big assignment) or until Sunday night, and get turned in an hour or two (or 15 minutes) prior to the actual time it was due.  This pattern was working well for me.  I did great work, got great feedback, and all was well with the world. 

Until yesterday.

You see, I failed to connect the actual due date of my final assignments to any part of my brain, and had just assumed Sunday at midnight would end this particular procrastination-fest.  And this week, the non-slacking Wednesday job didn't happen either.  I took a sick day on Thursday, thinking I could catch up, and then - ironically - actually turned out to be sick, and got nothing done.

So finally, Friday rolled around and it was time to start thinking about what needed to get done this weekend.  Where I would normally have checked the site to see what was due, I didn't because the computers at school were too busy having a virus, and I had to spend my first several hours at home inoculating my home computers against the same bug.  And then I went to Wal-Mart and turned a trip to pick up one tiny thing (a leaf blower) into a two-hour love-fest with my favorite retail Romeo.  Anyway, I did, eventually, come home, whereupon I ate my dinner while I casually perused my e-mail, checked out a catalog that came in the mail, and generally farted around for a while.  At about 9 o'clock, I decided it was time to get serious, and I logged into my class online.  And served myself one first-class coronary, straight up.

I had e-mail from my professor on both class pages, reminding me that my final discussion board posts were due by 5 p.m. and my final papers were due at midnight.  

I believe I actually shrieked.

Long story short, in the 3 hours that followed I hammered out several (late) discussion board posts, a discussion summary, and 2 fairly high quality papers of 15 and 21 pages.  I was relieved to discover that Capella is located in the central time zone, which bought me an additional hour to work on the OTHER final paper, but I was ill-prepared to write it.  I really had not fully developed even the idea I was going to write about, much less researched it.  So, 42 minutes after it was due, with a heavy heart and a note of apology, I submitted a very inadequate piece of work.  

Then, after addressing my e-mail, I proceeded on to bed, where I should have remained for the next 12 hours (particularly considering that it was 3 a.m. when I finally fell in).  However, my guilty conscience had me up at 8, wondering how long it will be before I hear from my completely disgusted teacher.  

My point:  procrastination has a price.  It is, eventually, quite miserable, and not worth it.  I hereby assert that I will no longer procrastinate!  I will take the bull by the horns and I will be assertive and I will get what needs to be done - done, promptly, and with panache!  

And I'm going to get started on that immediately!  Right after I have a nap.