Elizabeth posted about Procrasti-humor yesterday, which reminded me of my habit of pracrastibaking, which I have blogged about in the past. Which is an actual thing. And I engaged in it this week when I made some absolutely sinful Reese’s Cup brookies.
Back in 2018 I stumbled on a New York Times article: Why Work When You Can Procrastibake? I do this on a fairly regular basis but I never knew it had a name. In fact, my husband, a college professor, is getting his second teaching award in 4 years and he firmly believes it’s because he feeds his kids the baked goods that I procrastibake.
Julia Moskin defines procrastibaking as the practice of baking something completely unnecessary, with the intention of avoiding “real” work and believes it to be a surprisingly common habit. Apparently, not all procrastibakers bake alike. Some make long, slow recipes that break up the entire day, returning to their work in between steps. Others whip up something quick to attempt to get the creative juices flowing. One person quoted in the article makes macarons because they can take several days. Jeez, I don’t kid myself with something that complicated. I usually do cookies, cakes, or brownies.
Procrastibaking is a thriving hashtag on Instagram so of course, I had to break and check Instagram. And it’s true. But, it’s not all good. Tim Pychyl, a professor of psychology at Carleton University in Ottawa, says that procrastination is one of few situations in which people consistently make choices that are demonstrably bad. So I guess I can’t pass it off as being creative.
There was a quote from a romance writer, Mia Hopkins: “When I was schoolteacher, I used to procrastinate by reading and writing romances,” she said. “When I started writing romance full time, I had to find a new way to procrastinate.” Gotta love that.
What is your procrati-_? Procratibaking, procrasticleaning, procrastisurfing (I’m also guilty of this)? And for Elizabeth, It’s procrasti-napping and procrasti-surfing.
Eight Ladies Writing 
All of the above, except for napping, which I reserve when I’m supposed to be watching TV with my husband, thus losing track of the plot and/or punchline.
My primary procrastination, though, is walking/hiking, which sometimes actually does let me brainstorm answers to plot problems.
I don’t believe walking/hiking is procrastination. I believe it is necessary to maintain your health. And I wish I could nap. My husband is a gold medal napper and I’m very jealous. The only time I ever nap is when I’m sick, which sucks the fun out of it.
All of the above for me, too, except for procrasticleaning, which I never do. However, I think I trend more toward procrastireading, followed by procrastibaking. I’ve been experimenting with different flours and sugars, not all to huge success, but I feel like I’m stretching my self a bit. Can’t always say the same about my reading material, which is often rereads of old favorites. Can’t have too many new things during a pandemic!
I reread all the time. I am finding that a lot of the new books just don’t interest me. I’m re-reading a Nora Roberts right now – Legacy – I love the heroine. Now I’m off to write. Oh, wait, I need to feed the sourdough.
I slowed down on the procrasti-baking once I mastered sourdough early on in the pandemic, but I’m still going strong on procrasti-cleaning, when I’m not procrasti-napping and procrasti-surfing that is. None of those tend to trigger creativity–fortunately, my morning shower and my evening walk do.
The shower is one of my creative spaces. And when I can’t sleep (which is often). Although, the problem with that is that it seems brilliant at 2 in the morning, but then I can’t fully remember it when I actually sit in front of the computer.