Cramming Time... Cramming for what?!?!

So, it's 10:40 on a Sunday night and your homework isn't done? Well, sport, drop a few frosty cubes in a tumbler, cap the Stoli, roll that chair up to your computer desk and get crackin'. But wait, what if you're 28 years old, wrapping up a wasted (but enjoyed) day watching nothing but sports, and have no obligations until 9AM tomorrow...? Then, I suppose, you can keep the drink and just enjoy the awkward sense of incompleteness.

See, the thing is, I've had this nervous feeling every Sunday night since, let's say, 1994, when the world started demanding deadlines of me. Regardless of my actual homework status, I start to hear a small voice in the back of my mind, nagging me, prodding me, posing the inevitable questions; "What have you forgotten to do? What will you think of, right as you wake up tomorrow, and realize you've left to get done at the last second?" But the trick is, these days there isn't any homework. There is just the ugly prospect of going to work, which, I will grant you, is scarcely as ugly as having actually left a project, proposal, or paper off until 90 minutes prior to class time. But none the less, the feeling persists. I shut off the putrid Sunday night football and tv-movie options and proceed over to my tiny steel and glass desk with my drink and I ponder the missed educational opportunities of the day. I read, I type, I comment on the world at hand, all the while wondering, "Are you sure there's not a European History chapter you need to read and summarize for class presentation?"

No, there isn't. All that is over. The grown-up world offers me deadlines that pop up in Outlook reminders during the designated work hours. I seldom miss them and I even more seldom forget them all together. Work is work and play is play, and ne'er the twain shall meet. No more half-drunken compositions that simply get the job of "at least having something to hand in" done. No more hastily concluded team-research projects. No, this boy has only duty at 10:53PM on Sunday Sunday!! night, that is to get ready for bed, rest up, and be prepared for the inevitable shitstorm that will reign (yes, I mean it that way) over us all as the work week begins in just a few hours.

I suppose it isn't the worst thing in the world to have a built-in mental reminder to get things done. It would seem, though, that it would be far more useful if it reminded me to pay the gas bill, fold the laundry, or move the car on street-sweeper day. Who needs to be reminded to draft a preliminary thesis on the depiction of Asian-American supporting characters in early 20th century Hollywood cinema, when he manages financial accounts for a living? Damn books!