Wasting time - crock pot fever

I am happy (happy?) to say that I am not the only one who has a problem with wasting too much time. When I asked my friends for their stories, I had many very quick answers. Which wasn't wasting time, it is communicating with a friend. However, my friend Ruth Reid is not sharing her own ways of wasting time (why not, Ruth? haha) but instead, her husband's. This is a classic.
Ruth Reid: Since college, my husband and I have shared a theory of wasted time, we call it the "crock pot syndrome." I diagnosed his illness (okay, I'm not a doctor nor do I pretend to be), but my husband (boyfriend at the time) had the crock pot disease.
When he should have been deep in study for final exams, he'd spend hours dicing carrots, celery, onions into minuscule pieces to make crock pot chicken. After hours of checking and rechecking his boiling chicken parts, he'd ladle it over rice. Yes, It was a gross as it sounds. Sometimes you'd dip the ladle in the pot and pull up only chicken bones. I learned early to eat before going to his house. (Although it took 5 years of dating before I made that confession.)
What I remember, besides the grease film of boiled chicken skin on my tongue, was the wasted hours it took to shop for and prepare the meal. I used to tell him if he put those same hours into studying, he wouldn't panic during finals. I also, the studious person I was, pointed out that the only time he cooked was before finals. He unknowingly planned to waste time. I always thought it would be more fitting if he'd cook in a pressure cooker because inevitably that's what he did by wasting study time.
After we got married, the first thing I did was throw out his crock pot. Now, when we catch each other procrastinating, we ask, "what's in your crock pot?"

Uh... I have 2 crock pots. I don't use them tremendously often, but I have this great recipie for crockpot Apple Butter, which is fantastic on whole wheat toast... I make it every year. For those out there who know me well, I bet you can't imagine me in the kitchen making preserves, can you? Well, this is one thing I do. I won't tell you all my shortcuts, my grandmother would roll over in her grave, but my grandmother never had a dishwasher.
Oops, I digress.
Here's my thought/question of the day. Like Ruth's husband, do you ever deliberately waste time? What do you do, and here's the important question... what are you avoiding, and why?

Wasting time - and time well wasted

My new topic of the month is about how we all tend to waste time, and as a bonus, how we can justify it. Yes, with enough effort, we can justify almost anything.
I know I waste a lot of time on the computer, I could do much more writing, but instead I find myself addicted to Spider Solitaire. Hands up, I know I'm not alone!

We all can say email wastes time, but really, it's communication with friends and the price is right. I can completely justify email! As well, all the email loops I'm in, they are for many purposes besides friendship - writing, music, and even help on my electronic gadgets. It's not wasting time to talk about music, unless of course I should be practicing for our next gig or concert. Oops, I'm going to change the subject.

Sometimes I waste time when I go grocery shopping. I have no idea why. We all know those days when we go for one item and come out with 20 things we didn't intend to buy and don't need... and then we don't have the one thing we went for in the first place. (Costco anyone?)

Wasting time, we all do it, and we can always justify it.

So for the next month, let's see what some of my friends have to say.
Feel free to comment or email me if you want to contribute. It's not wasting time. It's sharing.