To a friend...

Procrastination is a Pandemic

procrastination: deferment or putting-off of an action or task, usually by focusing on some other distraction

Started my elective attachment in HK recently and the medical students here are perhaps dominated (synonym: owned) by study - not unlike dental school in Perth. Move aside 'I study 5 hours every night'; molded by unpredictable exams, high expectations and competition against those who do precisely this as well, the 45 minute extra lunch breaks need filling in with those two chapters, an early day off hospital equates to extra study time before dinner. And for those studying for their final exams, their life consists of incessant cycles of sleep-wake-study with the occasional interruptions of food, drink and nature callings (much like waking up to go to the toilet). And if you are reading this (Julian, Janice, Rita etc), don't get me wrong, I'm utterly impressed at the dedication.

But one day I heard the word 'xanga' - not once, but twice...in fact, in a short while it appeared that nearly everyone had it. Some wrote entries every few days, others a consistent daily ritual. There's the photo uploads, the lyrics quote and some are just long, detailed, in-depth accounts of all the wonderfulties in a day...everyday. And when I think back to how we study in Perth, no matter med, eng, commerce, high school, post-grads, no matter theory or practical, advanced or foundational, single or attached, short-sighted or not - there is inherently one thread that binds all students with an invariable characteristic. Procrastination is a pandemic. And I love it.

Excerpt from Danah Michelle Boyd "Friendster and Publicly Articulated Social Networking":

Notably, most users fear the presence of two people on Friendster: boss and mother. Teachers also fear the presence of their students. This articulated concern suggests that users are aware that, in everyday activity they present different information depending on the audience. Given the task of creating a Profile, users elect to present themselves based on how they balance the public/private dimension.

A View - Part 1

Think about a friend you have. She has an exam in two days. And right now she is in her room studying, blinds open and night outside. Sitting at her table with lecture notes in front of her, reading the 5th powerpoint slide from the second page. Next to the notes on her right hand side is her text book, turned to the chapter she's referring to, with a bookmark in the index.

'Causes' is the heading of the slide. It's in the same font as the rest of the text. It doesn't really look like a heading at all. Highlight it? What colour? Have pink, yellow and orange - won't use blue, it's not even fluoro. Pink. Pink is nice and bright. Hmm, highlighting 'Causes' means highlighting all the other headings. Consistency is good. Too much pink would make the lecture notes look messy. Think yellow's gentler to the eye. Yellow. With her left hand she reaches the top leaf of her pencil case, lifts it and sees the yellow highlighter. She picks it out of the pencil case with her right hand. Where's the lid? Must've lost it in the lecture. Note to self: see if it's still there when next semester starts. Another note: use something else as a bookmark next time. She rotates the lecture notes anticlockwise 45 degrees and so aligns it for the stroke of her arm as she highlights the heading 'Causes'.

How am I going to remember these? The 8 causes are so different. Except the first two, I guess I can draw the relation between them. How about making an acronym for them? This is so boring.

   Increased production from factories

   Increased production from the environment

   Flawed perception from the community

   Growing number of youths

   Lack of Government support

   Economic limitations of small countries

   Rapidly advancing technology

   Lack of education.

IIFGLERL? This is stupid. Does this really matter? But they're probably going to have a multiple choice question on this - something on the lines of "which of these is not a cause?", actually they'll even capitalise the 'NOT'. No this isn't going to work. I'm not going to remember what 'L' would stand for even if I knew it was 'Lack'. Have to rearrange it. Wait, I don't even need to include the first two, they're so obvious. 6 left, much easier. How about have 'Community', 'Youth', 'Government', 'Econcomic limitations', 'Technology', 'Education'. CYGETE. Kind of looks like cygnet. Think of a better one. How about put Y at the end...something CY - GETECY? GEETCY? Hmm, better to have E in front of CY. TEGECY. Wait CEY works as well. GETCEY? how about put YET together, leaves with CGE, CEGYET? GECYET? This is stupid. These letters don't work. GET together, at least that's a word - and you can GET anything. GETCEY? Hmmm wait, how about I make CEY sound like KEY? Then it'll be like GETKEY...but spelt as GETCEY? Yes GETCEY.

She closes her eyes. What are the causes? GETCEY. G for Government - lack of funds? No support. Lack of support. E. What was E? Education. Wait was Economic as well. Doesn't matter. Oh wait, there's the two obvious ones first - increased production from factories and environment. Yes 5 already now. Hang on, what about education? Think it was a lack of education. I'll check. Wait no, have to remember the other ones first or else my eyes would just skim through the other causes. I'll just say it was lack of education - you can't really have excessive education. Economic - limitations? Small countries. Yes the lecturer said something about New Zealand and everyone laughed. Hmmm so TC and Y left, I've done the other E. T - technology, rapidly advancing. C is community - screwed up perceptions. Y - hehe York. Where is York? And New York - what were the British settlers thinking about? What's that place called in New York, where they have all those games? Is it the same place as the David Letterman show? Oh crap, what was I supposed to be thinking. New York. York. No, Y. What's Y? Youths. Too many of us. Yes, I think I got them all right.

She checks the list. Hehe score. Need a reward. Toilet break plus Kit Kat and a glass of water. No wait, still have 4 lectures to go through after this one. It's 12 already. This sucks. But Kit Kat makes me think better. No. OK, I'll go for a break after I've finished this lecture. How many pages do I have left? She flicks through her notes. 6. Haven't even done half of this lecture. Not even a third. Well about a quarter. I'll say a quarter.

Now stop. Questions:

How would you feel if she ended up getting 85% for the exam?

How would you feel if she died on the way to her exam in a car accident?

- Dorothy Nevill