Pass away long,
pointless hours with our bumper list of things to do when you're well and truly
bored
1. THINGS YOU CAN DO WITH ABSOLUTELY
NOTHING
Blink wildly and then close your eyes
really tight for an interesting light show
(Amusement
Potential: 1-5 minutes)
See a variety of
blobs, stars and flashes. Try to make out shapes and see if your subconscious
is trying to send you a message (perhaps that funny shape is saying, 'send all
your money to urban75.com'?)
See how long you can hold a note
(Amusement
Potential: 4-20 minutes)
Not that much fun,
but it sure passes the time. Play with a friend, or try to beat your own
personal best. Inhale deeply and then try and make a noise for as long as you
can. Earn extra points for making your partner laugh or ending on an amusing
note.
Try to not think about penguins
(Amusement
Potential: 1-5 minutes)
This is especially
hard, because by trying too much, you remember what you were trying to avoid
thinking of. If you try too little, you end up thinking about penguins anyway.
Use your secret mind power
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Pick a passing by
and try to use your mind power to command them do something, like drop their
bag or knock into someone. The law of averages dictates that sooner or later
one of your mind commands will come true, so you can convince yourself that you
really have super human powers and waste even more time trying them out.
Pretend you're a robot
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
Walk down the street
with mechanical movements, adding 'zzzzzt' sounds with each motion. Pretending
to have a motor broken in, say, your left hand can add at least 30 seconds more
entertainment.
Scratch yourself
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
Go ahead, scratch
yourself now. Even if nothing itches, go ahead. Doesn't that feel pretty good?
Rate passers by
(Amusement
Potential: 10-15 minutes)
Secretly award
passers by marks out of ten as you go along, offering (unsaid) expert criticism
over their clothing, hairstyle and footwear choices.
Repeat the same word over and over
until it loses its meaning
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
Pick a random word
out of a magazine and say it aloud to yourself until it becomes a meaningless
set of noises.
Pinch yourself
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
What is pain? Why is
it unpleasant? There's nothing physical about it - it's all in your mind. Plus,
after pinching yourself for awhile, boredom will seem nice next to being in
pain.
Try to swallow your tongue
(Amusement
Potential: 1-2 minutes)
There's not much to
say about this one. It is possible, but really stupid.
Pretend to be a car
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Make appropriate
revving noises in your head as you walk along and add a racing commentary as
you pass strangers in the street. Use blinking eyes as indicators for extra
authenticity.
Make Star Trek door noises
(Amusement
Potential: 1-2 minutes)
Stand by an electric
door to a bank or something and make that silly "Scccccccchwop" sound
heard whenever people popped on to the bridge to hang with Captain Kirk.
Look at something for awhile, shut
eyes, study after image
(Amusement
Potential: 2-5 minutes)
Another great time
waster. It takes about 30 seconds of staring to create an after image, and the
image is then viewable for about the same length of time. Fun to combine this
one with pushing on your eyes.
Get yourself as nauseated as possible
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Best achieved by
looking straight up and spinning around. Try to be so dizzy you can't even
stand up. This is also entertaining due to the "makes boredom seem a lot
better" effect (see "Hurt Yourself").
Invent a weird twitch
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Adopt a bizarre
twitch (e.g. flicking your head irregularly, twitching with eye or busting out
sporadic cough noises) and try it out when you go shopping.
Make a low buzzing noise
(Amusement
Potential: 15-30 minutes)
Hours of fun in
libraries! Keeping a totally straight face and looking nonchalant, make a low
pitch humming/buzzing noise and see who reacts.
Still bored? Still itching for
something to do?
Keep wasting the
hours away with our pointless list of things to do
2. THINGS YOU CAN DO WITH VERY LITTLE
See what's in your neighbour's
rubbish/trash
(Amusement
Potential: 20-30 minutes)
You can learn a lot
about people by what they throw out. You might uncover some dark secret about
them. Plus, they might be throwing out something with value that still works,
like a VCR or some porn mags.
Watch TV, repeat everything said in
Italian accent
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Sort of
entertaining. Include flamboyant shoulder shrugs for added impact, or go for a
Marlon Brando set of grunts.
Send spooky emails
(Amusement
Potential: 15-60 minutes)
Look up someone's CV
on the web, do some research on them via Google and then send them an email
full of personal references claiming to be an ex-work colleague who fell in
love with their shoes. Or something.
Play our useless games
(Amusement
Potential: how long have you got?)
Waste
away the hours with our collection of useless games
Make prank phone calls
(Amusement
Potential: 20-60 minutes)
Very entertaining,
but requires discipline. Remember - vulgarities don't make a call funny, but
getting the other person to believe a ridiculous story will. Try seeing if you
can get them to make noises to 'test' the line. One to get you started off: Call
McDonalds with weird complaints about their food.
Pretend all humans will die except
for people in room with you
Amusement Potential:
10-20 minutes)
What would you do if
this really happened? Would the group stay together, or would there be
factions? Who would join what group? Remember, there would only be power for a
few days before the plants ran out of fuel or broke. To travel, you would
always have to be near cars to siphon gas out of. Best to do with people you
know.
Step off a curb with eyes shut,
imagine it's a cliff
(Amusement
Potential: 2-5 minutes)
To get any benefit
out of this one, you have to have a good imagination. Don't step off
immediately, build up to the jump. Study the ravine below. Feel the winds at
that altitude. Step off and...AHHHHHH!!!!!
Try and sound Welsh
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
The key to sounding
Welsh is to make sure that your voice goes up at the end of the sentence, so
that everything sounds like a question. Throw in a superfluous 'isn't it?' at
the end of everything you say and you're halfway there. Isn't it?
Burn things with a magnifying glass
(Amusement
Potential: 5-30 minutes)
Ants are always fun
to use for this, but burning the face of someone you don't like, under some
circumstances, can be just as entertaining.
Still really, really bored? With a
friend?
Grab a friend and
help stave off the boredom with these pointless time wasters
3. THINGS YOU CAN DO WITH ANOTHER
PERSON
Have a water gargling contest
(Amusement
Potential: 5-10 minutes)
Put a glassful of
water in your mouth and see how long you can keep gargling for. Award yourself
extra points for loud and amusing gargling noises, and minus points if you
laugh.
Stare at the back of someone's head
until they turn around
(Amusement
Potential: 2-5 minutes)
This works on the
"I have the feeling I'm being watched" principle. Conduct an
experiment-does this really work?
Have a "Who is less
competitive" competition
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
Trying to win at
this will make you lose. Trying to lose makes you win which makes you lose. Not
trying at all makes you lose which makes you win which makes you lose.
Pick up a dog so it can see things
from your point of view
(Amusement
Potential: 3-5 minutes)
Think about it: your
dog has only seen the house from a viewpoint from 6" to 2' high (15 to 60
cm for all you metric fans). It's never seen the tops of counters, what you
keep on your desk, the tops of shelves, etc. Try looking at things from its point
of view, too.
Pull out a hair, stick in someone's
ear
(Amusement
Potential: 1-5 minutes)
Best done to
sleeping people. Added challenge in having no one else around, because then you
can't blame it on anyone else. Try to beat your record number of times before
the person catches on.
Pour water in hand, make sneeze
noise, throw water on back of person's neck
(Amusement
Potential: 5-15 minutes)
Always a good gag.
For an even bigger reaction out of the person, act like you're not sorry at all
for what they think you did. Comment instead on how big that sneeze was or
about how there was a lot of mucus in that one.
Can you out-hum your friend?
(Amusement
Potential: 1-3 minutes)
This is quite a
tough one - and as many friends as you like can join in.
Sit opposite your
friends, and then start humming to yourself as loud as you can. The winner is
the person who can keep the straightest face the longest - anyone who laughs is
disqualified.
Tip: try varying the
tone of your hum to put off your opponent!
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