Friday, August 10, 2007

Procrastination-- a Case Study

What I should be doing: practicing to get myself back in shape after a long summer, cleaning up my apartment, which is in a derelect state and I have to start teaching tomorrow morning, doing taxes, sorting out bills, etc.

Instead, I find myself doing Other Things. It is now 7:15p.m., want to see whether I get anything done. Will continue to write this entry, leaving spaces where I putter around doing something:

Chatting to my lodger, who has come to borrow a mixer so he can cook something for his girlfriend. They broke up some days ago, but breaking up evidently doesn't rule out having noisy and athletic sex.
....
Now taking pictures of some bows and violins I am holding for a retired colleague who wants to sell them.
....
Now talking on Skype to a friend of John's who has a problem. Have relayed her request to John, also on Skype from Minneapolis...
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Back to doing the photos. Have to get out the ironing board to put the bows on.
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Max the lodger back in to use my oven to cook something for his athletic girlfriend
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Phone rings, long call with ex-girlfriend, I should pick up my daughter at her new school on Monday, and I should look for a new piano for them, and ... well, a long list of things. I don't mind, but it is still exhausting to talk to her... back to doing photographs.
...
One of the bows is so odd, a curious carved ivory base and a mottled wood stick, looks like it has measles.
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Photograph the 2 violins he gave me, one is an Austrian instrument from 1879, maker's name sadly illegible, I will Google the town and his first two names, see if I come up with something...
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Isn't Google amazing? For a start, I learn that Klingenthal isn't in austria, it is in Germany... just: about a mile from the Czech border. Has a long history of violinmaking. the only name legible on the violin label was Johann (his first name), but by process of elimination I think it must be Johann Christoph Merz, and the date must be 1809, not 1879. This increases the value of the violin (assuming the label is authentic) by about $8000.
...
Max the lodger has come down to get his fish out of the oven. This leads me to wonder if I am hungry, decide that I am, so put a pizza in.
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Max's girlfriend also wanders down, dressed in a bare minimum. She loves displaying her tatoos, which are numerous and well-distributed.
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Cordelia calls on Skype, wanting to know if I have left any Rawlplugs at their house. At first I don't understand what she is asking, because I cannot imagine she knows what they are.
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Now my pizza is beeping. Maybe I will eat it.
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It is now 9 p.m. How am I doing?
Comments:
A nice little commune you are having there, noisy sexy lodgers and a busy oven. No wonder you could`t get everything done, tattooed distractions and all :)
 
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