Eh, I’ll Title This Entry Later.

Ah yes, yet again procrastination rears its ugly head, until, as always, I am snatched from the jaws of panic by the intricate workings of fate and coincidence.

What the hell am I talking about? Who knows. All I know is that, damn, I’m lucky. You see, I am a professional procrastinator, or at least I would be, if I could just get around to applying for the title. (What’s my excuse? I don’t know. I suppose I can always say that I’m maintaining my amateur status so that I can compete in the Procastolympics. They don’t exist? Oh yes, I know. It’s sad. They’ve been toying with the idea for a couple thousand years, but nothing’s ever really come of it. I wonder why?)

I was supposed to have my first performance for that dinner theatre tonight, which I’ve known for at least three weeks now. There’s been no real way for me to have any rehearsal time, so I need to know that script (not to mention the blocking) backwards and forwards. I should be able to do that show in my sleep by now, but I’m not. Sure, I’ve read over it a whole bunch of times, but I never sat down to do the legitimate memorization and preparation that needed to be done. I studied half-heartedly at work yesterday, but ended up having to leave early because of a migraine. (The migraine was unrelated to the studying. Sure, I hate doing it, but it doesn’t actually hurt me.) I slept for most of the afternoon and evening, and then planned on staying up for most of the night working, but instead got caught up in a conversation with an old friend whom I hadn’t spoken to in a while. Oops. When I woke up this morning, I decided to stay home from work for the day and bust my ass. Instead, I lingered in bed, played on the computer, polished my toenails, and scrubbed the bathtub.

It was three o’clock, and I was still unprepared for a seven o’clock call when my phone rang — it was the manager of the show, calling to say that tonight’s performance had been canceled due to an uncharacteristic lack of sales. Bingo! I’m in the clear, and I have a whole extra week to work on this material. Think I’ll actually get it done? Who knows.

The thing is, this kind of last-minute reprieve happens to me all of the time. Dozens of times in high-school, I avoided writing important papers until there was so little time left that I would have to attempt to pass off a poorly-written first draft as a completed assignment, only to discover upon walking into the classroom that there was a substitute teacher that day, and I would have an entire extra night to clean up my work. At my old job, where I actually had deadlines (unlike now, where it doesn’t matter what I do or even if I show up at all,) the deadlines for projects I had completed on time always stayed the same, but whenever it happened that I wasn’t prepared, someone would mysteriously come around and grant me a few extra precious hours. I don’t understand why things always work out for me that way, and while a part of me appreciates it, I know that all it’s really done is allowed me to keep on procrastinatin’. Maybe if I got caught at school, or found myself on the receiving end of a lecture at work, or humiliated myself in front of an audience once in a while, I’d learn how to get things done on time. Really, this slippery little thing called fate is doing me no favors at all by being so kind to me.

Anyway, if you need me, I’ll be over there on the couch, with the script in my hand. Doesn’t mean I’ll actually be studying it, but hey, it’s something.