How To Write A Quality Paper at The Eleventh Hour

7 pm
Open textbook to the index.
Check email.
Find the appropriate chapter.
Go make tea.
Search the internet for academic papers and journal articles.
Spend 20 minutes saving promising articles.
Rename the folder that the articles are in.
Look at the textbook again.

8 pm
Go make toast.
Eat an orange.
Clean the bathroom.
Put the laundry in the washing machine.
Check email again.
Check facebook.
Oh look! A new message!
Respond to the new message.
Go back to the original textbook - oops I closed it.
Find the right chapter again.

8:30 pm
Create a world file.
Save the file as "Rough draft of essay".
Create a title page.
Check Facebook.
Eat a granola bar.
Vacuum the floor.
Check Facebook.
Comment on pictures.
Create a header/footer for the paper.
Create a citation for the textbook, that I have yet to read.
Read the introduction to the chapter.
Wrong chapter.

9 pm
Give up on the textbook.
Spend 10 minutes on a painfully slow internet connection searching the Harvard Business Review November/December 2006 issue for a specific article.
Oops....typed 1996 instead of 2006.
Spend 10 more minutes searching the real 2006.
Switch song on iTunes.
Next.
Next.
Check Facebook.
Switch laundry from washer to dryer.
Eat more food.
Take some notes from journal articles.
Create citations for more yet-to-be-used articles.
Check my phone for text messages that might have silently sneaked in.
No new messages.

10 pm
Check Facebook - 1 new message.
Youtube Ellen deGeneres for awhile.
Check email.
Watch an episode of Friends.
Half an hour of solid word - 6 pages of notes.
New message on MSN
Type out the notes/carry on conversation on MSN
Word check.
Lament how much I have left to write.
Eat another orange. Mmm, mandarin oranges!
Realize that forgot to buy crackers today.

11 pm
Word check - still the same as the last time I checked.
Add heading titles.
Word check.
Now it's +50 words.
Celebrate.

Midnight
The library is jam packed.
Check Facebook.
Take a few more notes from a new textbook.
Take a long look around the library- hey, look...3 of my flatmates are here too!
MSN alert.
I can't see the stars outside.
The girl across from me is on her ninth cup of coffee.
Stretch.
See another flatmate.
Hey, how's it going?
Ok...focus! More notes.
Word count.
Sigh. It's going to be a long night!
Write a second blog post for today, entitled "How To Write A Quality Paper" (you can all thank me later)

Rinse.
Repeat.

The Final Product: A quality paper entitled "The Effects of Increased Global Demand for Corporate Social Responsibility Displayed in The Body Shop's Global Marketing Stragegy: Past, Present and Future" (I know, I know, I lead a horribly fascinating and exciting life)

9 am
Crawl into bed.

11:53 am
Crawl out of bed

12:00 noon
Hand in paper (and look good doing it)