The Weekend: No Direction At Home

I’m going to throw out a couple of phrases. Hopefully, they will sound familiar. God knows I recognise them.

TGI FRIDAYS

LIVING FOR THE WEEKEND

To a cultural sponge like myself, the message is clear. Weekends = Awesome. If you are not having amazing fun at the weekend, There Is Something Wrong With You.

And, fortunately, some of my favourite experiences have taken place at the weekend. I won’t bore you with a list, but suffice it to say that, if everyone’s weekend life was as exciting as mine… well, the heart attack rate would have quadrupled by now. (Because sometimes I eat bacon, you see.)

But more often than I’d like, the weekend doesn’t live up to the billing. It’s alright, but I find myself feeling I should enjoying it more. I’ve thought the problem through, and decided to share my conclusions, in the unlikely event that someone else finds them useful…

Taking Your Order

There are some rubbish things about the regular working day, but I’ll say this for it: At least it has structure. Get up at time X, achieve Y by time Z, drink T, excrete P, have some LUNCH, go home, get drunk, weep gently into your pillow, fall asleep, repeat.

The weekend suffers from no such constraints, and usually, this is the wonder-blessing from heaven. But, every once in a while, I find myself going back to bed for an hour or so in the middle of a Saturday, just lying there thinking “…Okay, what now?”

Obviously, the answer is “Have another coffee and throw some more content up on the internet,” which is what I always do. But why does it take so long, each time, to come to this logical conclusion? Lack of direction. Weekends encourage freedom, freedom leads to a general sense of “Hmm.”

Hence why I enjoy weekends with a clear task list, or even better, a timetable. Leave me to my own devices and, honestly, I almost find myself yearning for work. (This feeling is always fleeting, and certainly long gone by Monday.)

TGITV

There is, of course, one thing which can impose order on any period of time. Is it… meditation? Self-help websites? Religion? Buying an iPhone?

Of course it isn’t. It’s television. (Or the radio, I suppose.) The idiot box has a schedule, and now that every home can get dozens of channels, it’s a pretty wide one. Not sure what to do? Find just one show worth watching, then think about what you could do in the time before and after. The answer could easily be watching more TV, but we judge not for such things.

You’d be amazed how many confused weekends that strategy has helped me through.

The Rest

Lest I forget, not everyone wants to get anything done at the weekend. Here at Feeding The Black Dog, we try and remain aware that doing absolutely nothing is an end in itself. Maybe you don’t suffer from directionless confusion, as long as you have a TV, DVD player, internet connection and the occasional friend or family member.

If so, I somewhat envy you. Well done. You can probably ignore most of this bibble and get back to that new DVD boxset. (I’m probably going to reward myself with some TV now as well.)