Time for Our New Year's Resolutions

Brenda’s got a post up about her First New Year’s Resolution.

To waste more time. Yep. I love wasting precious time. In fact, wasting time may be the most subversive act left to us in a culture that is so fucking obsessed with both saving it and complaining, not to mention boasting, about never having enough of it.

I’m with Brenda on people being obsessed with boasting about not ever having enough time. Those boasters should make it their First and Final New Year’s Resolution to stop trying to sound so important. We all know everyone screws around in one way or another, so put a sock in it already.

I feel like I waste too much time.

I’ve been fantasizing about being so busy in the new year (where so busy equals so profitable) that if I complained to you about never having enough time and you’d remind me of what I wrote above that I’d tell you that you have no idea what you’re talking about because I am that busy so put a sock in it already.

It’s all a win/win for me.

Always striving for the win/win was my New Year’s Resolution long ago, and I’ve stuck to it.

I’ve caught myself wasting vast amounts of time over the last year. For example, just last night, The Skimmer and I watched The Hangover for a second time. That could only be described as a complete waste of time, when there were other, more important things that could have been accomplished.

Until you consider that during those two redundant hours, I got to see Bradley Cooper not only wearing that black suit again, getting ready to hit the Vegas strip, but also wearing that bloody shirt while sporting that pouty, busted lip again both at the beginning and at the end of the movie.

In retrospect, that was time well spent. Time very well spent. I might just spend some very well spent time again tonight. Win/win/win.

I wasted way too much time this past fall complaining about the guy who lives behind us who cut down all of the trees on his property. Even got told to Get Bent because of it. Which sort of made me laugh. Hadn’t heard that phrase in years and years.

The Skimmer wasted more time than I did, though, thinking about that guy. And he’s still wasting time thinking about him. Recently The Skimmer said to me, as we stood in the kitchen and looked out on the three, four foot pine trees the guy has planted that will take about three zillion years to grow as tall as the ones he had just cut down had already grown, “Since that guy likes cutting down trees so much, we should go cut one of his new trees down and use it for our Christmas tree!”

The thought of the two of us doing that, all dressed in black under the cover of night, made me laugh. And I actually would have loved to have done it. Seemed like poetic justice. But, then I imagined us getting caught, arrested and thrown in the slammer. How would I stay so busy where so busy equals so profitable with all that time on my hands?!

Time is money, people! Or will be, for me, in the new year.

One thing I truly wasted time doing this year were the times I told other people what they should be doing. I try not to do that often but I catch myself doing it often enough. Like I know what other people should be doing, how they should be behaving, when half the time I don’t even know what I should be doing, or I catch myself behaving in such a way that if I saw someone else behaving that way I would probably tell them they shouldn’t be if that’s the sort of person I was most of the time.

A few months after Blue Kid was born The Skimmer and I went to a wedding. I was exhausted. I hadn’t slept in twelve weeks, but I stuffed myself into my pretty pre-partum black dress and off we went, excited to be getting out of the house. We were talking with a group of people when I happened to look down and notice a run in my stockings. I said, in my post-partum daze, “Oh no, I have a run in my stockings.”

“Well, you should always bring an extra pair of stockings when you go out, just in case.” Said the beautiful, sexy, thin, tall, childless blonde ever so helpfully.

“Put a sock in it, Blondie.” Is what I did not say to her as I thought of something much worse to say to her but didn’t say that either. I just nodded and smiled and agreed that I should not only always plan to be, but should actually be perfect in every way, every day.

So, it is a total waste of time to tell others what they should do and how they should behave because have I ever, in the last seventeen years, taken an extra pair of stockings with me when The Skimmer and I have gone out? No. Just to spite her. And I hope she has a million kids now and each of them are ripping at her stockings at this very moment, even all the extra pairs she carries with her at all times.

You might say thinking spiteful thoughts is a waste of time.

Sure is fun, though.

Besides being so busy where so busy equals so profitable in the new year, I’m not sure what my other resolutions are going to be.  If I wouldn’t have been so busy throughout the year doing all the things I should and shouldn’t have been doing, I probably would’ve had them all figured out by now.

Comments

[Dan Leo]

Damn, now I feel like I've been wasting my time because I haven't even seen The Hangover once.

Yet.

[Jennifer]

I’m with Brenda on people being obsessed with boasting about not ever having enough time.

Me, too!!!

Frankly, I get reeeeeally tired of people always having to act (I don't believe them all) like they're so frickin' busy that they just can't squeeze in one moment of wonder, or one moment of joy. To them, I give the raspberries.

Yes, I'm busy... some days as busy as sin, but you know what? I never want to be so busy that I'm not aware of the woodpecker on the tree or the shadow in the backyard or the favorite movie that is on, that I'll watch again, even though I've seen it enough.

I did not watch "The Hangover" last night, but did see "He's Just Not That Into You"... twice. :)

I plan on being productive in this new year. Productive for me includes lots of wasting of time. :) It works for me. Things come to me during those times. I'm not giving them up by being too busy to notice.

[Jennifer]

Dear. Lord.

I'm sorry for the VERY long comment...

[Jennifer]

Also... "He's Just Not That Into You" was not a favorite movie... but was innocuous and convenient...

[blue girl]

Jennifer, if I would add up the actual time I've "wasted" by watching the last 20 minutes of "Big" over the last few months, because I think it might be being replayed on HBO into infinity, I might be named the Monumental Time Waster of All Time!

But, I can't help it. I love to watch certain things in that movie. The facial expressions. Elizabeth Perkins' ginormous shoulder pads. The New York apartment. How the little kid actor totally looks like a little Tom Hanks. Or does he? I always analyze it. The way the little Tom Hanks' friend snarls up his face when Elizabeth Perkins tells him she's little Tom Hanks' girlfriend. The houses on the street where he lives. How pretty the houses are! How he shrinks and his suit is too big. I can never stop staring at that movie for one reason or another.

[blue girl]

Lover Boy, The Hangover is definitely worth seeing, even just once!

[zombie rotten mcdonald]

I watched three hours of Dirty Jobs last night, rather than working. Although it could be seen as wasting time, I learned about grunting worms and making maple syrup.

I watched the last half of the Hangover sunday night. I don't think it lost anything by being truncated.

[blue girl]

grunting worms

Ew! lol

The only thing you lost, my friend, is seeing Bradley Cooper in his black suit. Pshaw! Although it may not mean the same thing to you...

[Ken]

You are right: Telling people what they should do is a waste of time. That is, unless they are asking you for advice, of course. Then it becomes about what they did. That can easily become about what they should have done. That is a waste of time.

Since that person sitting in front of you looking for guidance about what they should do is looking for a helping hand. Then what they should have done is not only a waste of time--it is often gratuitously cruel.

[zombie rotten mcdonald]

I kept trying to figure out which characters in teh Hangover match up with Brando's Vegas adventures.

I don't remember any of Brando's characters wearing a black suit.

[Kathleen Maher]

My theory on wasted time, which doesn't apply to tedium like waiting in line for hours and then giving up because "I've wasted enough time!", is that any indulgent waste fosters creativity.
Otherwise we'd all work like automatons. Art demands leisure, always has.
This includes those whose artistic contribution consists mostly of loving art, reading fiction (anyone left out there?), listens with appreciation to music, and possibly (I don't know for certain because I'm so deficient here)studies movies and TV shows: your participation completes any artistic endeavor.
As a fiction writer, I'm convinced nothing I write is finished or even real until someone else reads it and either fits it into their own story or rejects it as a failed attempt. Failed art, for me, is better than none.

[ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®©]

I'm afraid I don't have enough time to read Jennifer's comment...
~

[Brenda]

Hah! We also watched the Hangover, AGAIN. I wanted to replay the moment of the missing tooth about a million times. That's how hard it makes me laugh. But that would have been a huge waste of time. So we watched The Big Lebowski. Again. And let's talk about a man who really knows how to waste some MAJOR time! It's turning into a theme here....Happy new year, BG. It's grand knowing you.

[zombie rotten mcdonald]

well, thankfully the Internet helps you avoid wasting time....

[blue girl]

Hey, everyone, Happy New Year!

And ZRM, don't think I haven't read what you've written over at Jeddie's.

I shall get back at you in the new year -- don't doubt it!

True story.

[blue girl]

Believe it...or don't!

[Wren]

That last sentence of yours made my eyes cross. But I caught your drift, honest! Happy New Year, BG and Skimmer and Klue Bid!

[blue girl]

That last one did? I thought that one was pretty tame compared to some of the others. lol

Happy New Year, Wren!

[Ronnie Day]

Funny,Mike Rowe did his worm grunting about 20 miles from our house.
I have in the past been one of those people who never had time and I am sure I will be again but for the last 4 weeks I have wasted a lot of time and it sure feels good.We have the next 5 nights here in N. Fla below freezing with 2 down in the teens,highs in the upper 40s so I am predicting another week of wasting time,in the past I would have been nuts but this year it just doesn't seem to matter.

HAPPY NEW YEAR to all