Wasting Time
Wasting time is... well, you know. That thing that people do. A good example of it would be saying what it is, because, you know... some people do it when they're bored, some people do it just because. You know. Anyway... yeah. Almost everyone in the world has wasted time at one point or another in their lives. It happens all over: in cities, towns, villages, countries, provinces, nations, states, continents, islands, hole-in-the-road towns barely big enough to hold a post office, everywhere.
There are two very basic categories of time-wasting: wasting your own time and wasting other people's time.
History of time wasting[edit | edit source]
Yes, of course we have to include a History section of the article. What do you think we are, clever? No, there are certain rules and regulations to be had. What? You don't believe me? Fine. Here's proof. Go to Google and look up "history laws". Click the forty-seventh result, scroll down until you get to the end, and click the third to last link on the page. Find the fourth paragraph, sixth word. Copy it and enter it into the Search bar on YouTube. Watch the first video result and enter the password given to you by the Oompa-Loompa in the background into MySpace, signing in with any email address. Check your Inbox and read the message from the guy named Dirk. After you read the message, go onto his profile and divide the number of friends he has by his age (his MySpace-posted age, not his real one), then multiply that number by the number of molecules in Leonard Nimoy's butt. Margin of error of three is acceptable. Take that number, Google it, and hit I'm Feeling Lucky. Find the median link and Google it. Read the very last result - it's probably an ad for porn or something, but congratulations. You have now wasted several days of your own time. For all I care, that's the history of wasting time right there.
Or maybe, time wasting began in the year 0 when God decided he was tired of having such a vast, infinite stock of time. He felt guilty because he was keeping it all to himself. So God said, "But what can I do with all this time? I don't really need it, and there's no real use for it." He had already tried various applications for time. He had tried making a time bunny out of it, but it had the nastiest habit of slipping through his fingers, no matter how long he held onto it. He tried skeet shooting with it, but it flew too quickly because skeet shooting was too much fun. Finally, God tried selling it online, but since "Every second is of infinite value", no one could afford it.
So God got frustrated with time, decided he was tired of dealing with its presence, kicked it out of Heaven. Lonely and dejected, time wandered the universe looking for a job. It applied for a job pumping gas at Alpha Centauri, but was turned down due to a lack of credit. It went for a clerking position at Galactic Central Point, but it wasn't bright enough to fulfill the position. Finally, desperate, time found a refugee's home on the planet Earth. However, time didn't realize that Earth was populated by humans, and thus some of its vastness was squandered for such things as pornography, France, and a hell of a lot of badgers.
Wasting Your Own Time, Part 1[edit | edit source]
So you want to waste time. Congratulations. Reading this article is a good start. Nominating it for Featured is another good start.
To waste your own time, you must first have time. Acquiring time is simple. One popular method is to wait. This is a fairly efficient method of wasting time because for every minute granted to you through waiting, one minute is wasted by waiting. However, this ratio is fairly low in comparison to other methods, and time only comes at a rate of one minute per minute, which is pretty slow.
Another method of acquiring time is using a time machine to manufacture some time. This makes things a bit more complicated- operating a time machine is generally not seen as "wasting", per se, so you have to subtract the time you take to operate the machine from the time the machine produces. However, this detraction is usually negligible because the time machine generates most of the time you need to waste.
Wasting Your Own Time, Part 2[edit | edit source]
Now that you've got time... ...how do you waste it? There exists a massive variety of ways to waste built-up time. A few are listed as follows:
- Read the same book more than once. Or watch a mystery movie more than once. Honestly, man! What are you going to do, act surprised at the ending? No wonder you have no life.
- Write angry "Letters to the Editor".
- Read a "Twilight" book. (WARNING: This waste of time will cause serious brain damage.)
- Ignore their replies, if any (this actually ties into "Wasting Other People's Time", but oh well.)
- Watch the news. I mean, really. Anything you would conceivably care about you should already know.
- Read UnNews. For the same reason as above.
- Fish.
- Write Uncylcopedia articles because you feel like you have a sense of humor.
- Make fun of random people. For example: My mom is so fat, when she puts on a yellow sweater people yell "Taxi!"
- Then laugh at the people who say those kinds of jokes because you're just trying to make them feel good, but deep down you're thinking "What an idiot."
- Being a n00b
- Graduating from high school, spending 30,000 dollars to get your bachelor's degree, spending 60,000 dollars to get your master's degree, taking the teacher's test and acquiring a license, THEN running the class how YOU want to. Now shut up and get back to work.
- Writing in white text in order to fool people. See? I fooled you. Ha! Bet you never saw that coming.
Wasting Other People's Time[edit | edit source]
Wasting other people's time is, fortunately, much easier than wasting your own. Also much more satisfactory. All you have to do is find some un|willing sap whose time you wish to waste, and waste it. What? You want to know how? Oh, honestly. Do I really have to lead you through with a carrot? Fine, fine...
Tell them a joke like this:
A boy turns five years old and his father asks him what he wants for his birthday. "I want a pink ping pong ball," said the boy. The dad doesn't get it, but he buys the boy a pink ping-pong ball anyway.
Five years later the kid turns ten and his father asks him what he wants. "I want a hundred pink ping pong balls," he says. The dad tries to change his mind, but the kid is stubborn, so the dad gives in and gets him what he wants.
Six years later, the kid turns sixteen and his father asks him what he wants. "I want a thousand pink ping pong balls," the kid says. This time the dad argues with the kid, trying to get him to accept something else (like, say, a car), but the kid won't listen. So, once again, he gets his way.
Two years later, the kid turns eighteen- finally an adult. The father asks him what he wants to celebrate, and he goes "Ten thousand pink ping pong balls." They argue all through dinner and well into the night, but the dad's claims that his son is crazy just won't get through to him. So he buys him the pink ping pong balls.
Three years later, the son turns twenty-one and his father offers to take him to a bar. The kid accepts, but only if he can have a hundred thousand pink ping pong balls first. The father doesn't even try arguing, and gets the kid what he wants. So they go out and have a beer at their local tavern.
On their way out of the bar, the son walks into the road and gets hit full-on by a semi. The father runs to the boy's broken body, and one look tells him that he isn't going to make it. As he stares into his son's eyes, tears welling up in his own, he asks his son one thing, one thing he's always wanted to know.
"Son... I just have to know this. What did you do with all of those pink ping pong balls?" And the kid looks up into his father's eyes... it's obvious he's fading fast... he slowly takes in a breath... whispers...
"Dad... I..." and dies. (He rented a storage unit, but keep it to yourself!)
Moral of the story: Look both ways before crossing the street.
Caution![edit | edit source]
Do not confuse wasting time with passing time. Passing time is the act of wasting time combined with actually doing something, which makes the whole concept of time wasting a senseless and confusing waste of time. Damnit.