YouTube: your new best friend.

Meet YouTube. You two are going to be very close for the next week. It can show the way to hours of time-wasting. You thought you could escape television, but you can’t. So why not indulge yourself in some quality streaming video? Dig up all those 90s cartoon shows you haven’t seen since childhood. Find re-runs of shows that were already re-runs when you watched them three years ago. Watch bizarre clips featuring dangerous stunts, funny pranks or unusual parodies.

Sometimes it takes some searching before you strike gold, but that wastes even more time. The great thing is one episode of “Are You Afraid of the Dark” is about 25 minutes, so while you can tell yourself, “I only watched that one set in a mall and the one about the dollhouse,” you really just ate up an hour. And that’s something you can be very proud of. 

It’s a Team Effort

The best procrastination can’t be done alone. Grab a friend, roommate or even a total stranger and have them assist in your time-wasting.

Engage your roommate in an unnecessary (preferably lengthy) conversation. Don’t know the person you live with that well? There’s no better time to find out. Ask your roommate about their childhood, friends or latest relationship problem. There’s nothing like a spontaneous group therapy session to make the hours go by. You might even dig deep and solve your emotional hang-ups.

Or grab a friend and while away precious minutes. Nobody knows you better than your friends, so you always have something to talk about. Even in the white walls of a study room on the library’s third floor, you can still gossip about almost anything.

All by yourself? Play a game of 1-100 like in “Sex and the City,” where you count how many random passers-by out of a group of 100 that you’d sleep with. This is best done in the library or coffee shop or other public arena, but it can provide a few laughs if you’re really bored and/or desperate. 

Avoid Facebook

Facebook is slower than ever during finals week because of the students who are avoiding studying. Maybe a game of beer pong is out of the question (or maybe not), but there are plenty of other ways to pass the time when your “Recently Updated” page is just taking too long to load and you’ve finished cleaning out your excess group memberships.

You have more important sites to look into, like bored.com, which features pages on nearly everything under the sun from movie scripts to your favorite films. Read one aloud and maybe even act it out.

Check out wikipedia for useless facts, or learn something new about a wide range of subjects. Do some internet shopping at everyone’s favorite, amazon.com. Chronicle your favorite celebrity’s entire media career at imdb.com (Internet Movie Database.) That site features favorite quotes, bloopers, and fun facts as well.

Addictinggames.com is a great resource for, well, addicting games. “Bubble Trouble” is a personal favorite, since it requires complete keyboard control without a pause bar. Look for games that take up your whole screen so you’ll stay focused.

Other sites to check out:

• Create your own Nintendo Wii character to look just like you on www.CreateMii.com
• Draw pictures with Lite-Brite online at www.sfpg.com/animation/liteBrite.html#
• Catch up on all the up to the minute celebrity gossip at ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com
• Feed into more nostalgia at www.freetetris.org 

Go Wireless

Not near a computer? Fear not, procrastinator. It’s arts and crafts time. Take up knitting and finish that scarf you started in tenth grade. Make a sculpture out of sticky-tack and paper clips.

Redecorate your dorm room or indulge yourself in a cleaning spree. There’s nothing like a looming fifteen-page paper to make you bust out the Swiffer cloths you ambitiously bought during welcome week and dust everything in sight.

Doodling is another great way to waste time. Practice your autograph, so you’ll be well schooled when you’re famous and never have to take another two-hour exam again. Hell, write your name with your crush’s name and add little hearts. You know you want to.

Draw a self portrait with the objects around you. Just get creative. Who knows, you may discover a hidden talent for notebook paper origami. 

Feed the Fire

Ordering food is another ultimate time-waster. No matter how much time you think it’s going to take, it seems to always be twice as long. Call in the traditional way or use web sites like GoGreenMenus.com or CampusFood.com. Try to get a friend to order with you so the two of you can argue over what to get after mulling over menus for over half an hour.

Get more creative than just pizza. Try to pick a food that goes with what you’re studying. Try sushi for science class because seaweed is brain food. Have a really tough paper due? Get some comfort food, like Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, which you can actually order in from D.P. Dough. When you finally order, don’t do anything while the food comes. You’re hungry, and you know you can’t focus when you’re hungry.