302 lines
14 KiB
Plaintext
302 lines
14 KiB
Plaintext
[p]
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• [1]The A.V. Club
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• [2]Deadspin
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• [3]Gizmodo
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• [4]Jalopnik
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[32][33]
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We may earn a commission from links on this page
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• [34]Home
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• [35]Latest
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• [36]Baseball
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• [37]Football
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• [38]Basketball
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• [39]Hockey
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• [40]Golf
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• [41]Soccer
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• [42]The Mourning After
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• [43]Wrestling
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• [44]Lists
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• [45]Tennis
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• [46]The Fights
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• [48]Racing
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[53]
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Locker
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Spend Exactly None Of Your Time Killing Time
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By
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[54]Chris Thompson
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PublishedJanuary 25, 2019
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We may earn a commission from links on this page.
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[55][56][57][58][59]
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Image for article titled Spend Exactly None Of Your Time Killing Time
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Illustration: Chelsea Beck (GMG)
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Here’s a good resolution, if you’re the sort of person who resolves to do good
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and healthy things and then maintains any hope of actually doing them: Resolve
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to divide your waking hours exactly and only between doing things you should be
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doing, and doing things you want to be doing.
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Watch
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What Jason Kelce’s retirement says about the Eagles future
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CC
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Share
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Subtitles
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• Off
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• English
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Share this Video
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[61]Facebook[62]Twitter[63]Email
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[64]Reddit[65]Link
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[66]view video
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[67]What Jason Kelce’s retirement says about the Eagles future
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[68]
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Which NFL team lands Jim Harbaugh as their next head coach?
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January 10, 2024
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[69]
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Josh Allen, Trevor Lawrence, or the Eagles: Who are the biggest frauds of the
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season?
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January 8, 2024
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When you are not doing something you should be doing—straightening up around
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the house, taking out the garbage, walking the dog, your job—you should always
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and only be doing something you actively want to be doing, like reading a book,
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or playing video games, or pursuing a hobby. Conversely, when you are not doing
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something you want to be doing, you should always and only be doing something
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you should be doing. This is a good resolution because it’s not aimed at some
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specific result that deviates a whole lot from who you are already, like
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overhauling your diet or your sleep regimen or whatever. No overhaul required,
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here. You already do plenty of what you’re supposed to do, and plenty of what
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you want to do. Resolve to stop doing anything else.
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Advertisement
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But I already do this, you are saying, as you sit at your desk, not working,
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procrastinating, avoiding work by dicking around on the internet and winding up
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on a dumb-ass late-January blog about, of all things, self-improvement. No!
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Right now, you are not following this very good advice. You are not doing what
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you should be doing—unless what you should be doing is reading blogs—nor are
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you doing what you really want to be doing, which is parasailing or skiing or
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hunting moose in [70]ye olde cowboy game. You are killing time, waiting for
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either the energy for work or the consequences of not doing work to give your
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life some feeble structure. Stop it! Killing time is the very habit we are
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trying to address, here. There’s barely enough time as it is.
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Advertisement
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Along the way you will need to hone your sense of what things you should be
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doing. You know the most obvious ones—they’re occupying the margins of your
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consciousness all the time, bearing down on you and poisoning the time you
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spend not doing them. Chores, assignments, projects, bills, phone calls,
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repairs, and so forth. The list is a little bit longer than that, which is both
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good news and bad news. It’s bad news because it includes things like talking
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to your folks on the telephone, or listening patiently while your spouse rants
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about their day, or brushing your teeth—things you put off doing nearly as much
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as work but which, I’m afraid, must be done. But it’s also good news, because
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by acknowledging that those are responsibilities, you have also earned the
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right to take some satisfaction from having fulfilled them.
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Advertisement
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Sometimes you have the bandwidth and energy to address your attention to the
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things you should be doing, and other times the thought of getting your car
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inspected or working out or washing a sinkful of dishes fills you with a sudden
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urge to throw yourself down a well. When you have the energy to do the things
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you should do, do them, or keep doing them. When you don’t—and this is
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crucial—go ahead and give yourself permission to set them aside for another
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time. But—and this is also crucial, because it is the lesson of this damn
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blog—when you give yourself permission not to do the things you should be
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doing, please spend the resulting block of free time doing something good and
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cool, something you genuinely want to do.
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You will also need to hone your sense of what it is you want to be doing.
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Today, the thing I most want to be doing in all the universe is riding Splash
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Mountain. That activity, I am afraid to say, is completely out of the question,
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in no small part because I am supposed to be doing the thing I least want to do
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in all the universe, which is working. Since I would certainly rather die than
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actually work, I’m going to do something else. But what? It helps to start all
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the way out at riding Splash Mountain, because understanding want in terms of
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genuine desire keeps you from slipping into the shitty headspace of just
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measuring activities against the dread and misery of work. In almost all cases
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I would rather be watching Law & Order reruns than doing chores, but that
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doesn’t mean I really want to be watching Law & Order reruns. In the endless
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list of things I could conceivably do with a day, watching Law & Order reruns
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is probably closer to doing chores than it is to riding Splash Mountain. In
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fact, I often default to watching Law & Order reruns because some part of my
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brain recognizes that it keeps me anchored in place near the chores, and isn’t
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so joyful that I can be said to be really enjoying myself, which is clearly
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something I don’t deserve.
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Advertisement
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So it is with scanning headlines or surfing Instagram or refreshing Twitter,
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the grey shit you do compulsively when you are procrastinating. Yes, you would
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rather be doing those things than painting your living room—anything, including
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bleeding from the eyeballs, is better than painting—but that doesn’t
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necessarily mean they’re worth a shit. If you’re not going to paint the living
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room, that’s fine! But now use the time on something good! In my case, if I
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start all the way out at riding Splash Mountain and work backward from there,
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long before I get to watching Law & Order reruns, I will arrive at things like
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bowling or going to the movies or hunting moose in ye olde cowboy game. Those
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are things I find myself wanting to do, but rarely give myself permission to
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do. Ask yourself, “What are some activities that would be genuinely fun?” Make
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a list! Cross off the stuff you know you can’t do, and then pick and do one of
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the ones you can. Go to the zoo. Watch a horror flick. Try out a new bar. Read
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a few chapters of a good book.
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It can feel reckless and irresponsible to spend your day bowling or baking or
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hunting moose in ye olde cowboy game, but a big chunk of the guilt associated
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with these activities stems from not really giving yourself permission to do
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them, at least in part because too much of your average day is already given
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over to tweeting at Jonathan Chait. But it’s healthy and productive to do cool
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and fun things that enrich your life! The solution, here, is to buy yourself
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the time to do the really interesting things by first being honest with
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yourself about all the sweaty hours you waste tweeting at Jonathan Chait. You
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are a successful and prolific time-killer because you’ve got a selection of
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ways of doing it that are marginally less dreary and more stimulating than
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folding laundry or managing spreadsheets, and some inherited puritanical
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impulse that tells you you’re still close to upright so long as you’re not
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actually enjoying yourself. Bullshit! When you are not doing what you are
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supposed to do, do something you genuinely want to do. That’s the rule.
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Advertisement
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Of course, there will be any number of times when you are prevented from doing
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any of the things you want to be doing. The rule is also this: When you cannot
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do what you genuinely want to do, do what you are supposed to do. Here is a
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good life hack: when you lack the bandwidth to take on an important chore or
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duty, you probably still have the bandwidth to make a list of all your
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important chores and duties. Do that! This counts as a thing you should be
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doing, because often enough in making the list you will hit on something that
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requires little enough of you that you can take it on right away, without too
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much suffering. And even if you don’t, the making of the list will bring you a
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little closer to addressing yourself to the items on it, and that’s enough of a
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positive step that when the time comes for you to do something you want to do,
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you will feel the satisfaction of having earned it, through work. That’s what’s
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missing from the shame-soaked hours spent avoiding and procrastinating: the
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feeling that you deserve to have a good time, and the permission to have one.
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Of course, you will probably fall short of dividing your time exactly equally
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between responsibilities and pursuits. Don’t think of that as failure. When you
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remember this wise practice, when it occurs to you, treat it as a rule and
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follow it. Ah, right, I said I wasn’t gonna sit here stewing in my anxiety all
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afternoon, so instead I’m going to go see [71]Into the Spider-Verse. Good plan!
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You are going to end the day with something to show for it, and that’s the
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whole idea.
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Continue reading
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References:
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[1] https://avclub.com/
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[2] https://deadspin.com/
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[3] https://gizmodo.com/
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[4] https://jalopnik.com/
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[5] https://kotaku.com/
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[6] https://qz.com/
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[7] https://theroot.com/
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[8] https://thetakeout.com/
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[9] https://theonion.com/
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[10] https://theinventory.com/
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[11] https://deadspin.com/
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[12] https://deadspin.com/
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[13] https://deadspin.com/
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[14] https://deadspin.com/latest
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[15] https://deadspin.com/baseball
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[16] https://deadspin.com/football
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[17] https://deadspin.com/basketball
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[18] https://deadspin.com/hockey
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[19] https://deadspin.com/golf
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[20] https://deadspin.com/soccer
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[21] https://deadspin.com/locker/the-mourning-after
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[22] https://deadspin.com/wrestling
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[23] https://deadspin.com/lists
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[24] https://deadspin.com/tennis
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[25] https://deadspin.com/the-fights
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[26] https://deadspin.com/olympics
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[27] https://deadspin.com/racing
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[28] https://deadspin.com/poker
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[29] https://deadspin.com/media
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[30] https://deadspin.com/locker
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[31] https://es.deadspin.com/
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[32] https://deadspin.com/search
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[33] https://deadspin.com/newsletter
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[34] https://deadspin.com/
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[35] https://deadspin.com/latest
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[36] https://deadspin.com/baseball
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[37] https://deadspin.com/football
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[38] https://deadspin.com/basketball
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[39] https://deadspin.com/hockey
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[40] https://deadspin.com/golf
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[41] https://deadspin.com/soccer
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[42] https://deadspin.com/locker/the-mourning-after
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[43] https://deadspin.com/wrestling
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[44] https://deadspin.com/lists
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[45] https://deadspin.com/tennis
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[46] https://deadspin.com/the-fights
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[47] https://deadspin.com/olympics
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[48] https://deadspin.com/racing
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[49] https://deadspin.com/poker
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[50] https://deadspin.com/media
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[51] https://deadspin.com/locker
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[52] https://es.deadspin.com/
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[53] https://deadspin.com/locker
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[54] https://deadspin.com/author/miserableshitehawk
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[55] https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?via=deadspin&url=https%3A%2F%2Fdeadspin.com%2Fspend-exactly-none-of-your-time-killing-time-1831777904%3Futm_medium%3Dsharefromsite%26utm_source%3Ddeadspin_twitter&text=Spend%20Exactly%20None%20Of%20Your%20Time%20Killing%20Time
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[57] https://www.reddit.com/submit?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdeadspin.com%2Fspend-exactly-none-of-your-time-killing-time-1831777904%3Futm_medium%3Dsharefromsite%26utm_source%3Ddeadspin_reddit&title=Spend%20Exactly%20None%20Of%20Your%20Time%20Killing%20Time
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[59] https://deadspin.com/spend-exactly-none-of-your-time-killing-time-1831777904
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[65] https://deadspin.com/what-jason-kelce-s-retirement-says-about-the-eagles-fut-1851169895
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[66] https://deadspin.com/what-jason-kelce-s-retirement-says-about-the-eagles-fut-1851169895
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[67] https://deadspin.com/what-jason-kelce-s-retirement-says-about-the-eagles-fut-1851169895
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[68] https://deadspin.com/which-nfl-team-lands-jim-harbaugh-as-their-next-head-co-1851156349
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[69] https://deadspin.com/josh-allen-trevor-lawrence-or-the-eagles-who-are-the-1851149579
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[70] https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/i-like-chopping-firewood-in-red-dead-redemption-2-1830178593#_ga=2.215259543.149258240.1547482638-1486199056.1525795056
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[71] https://film.avclub.com/superhero-dimensions-collide-in-a-funny-gorgeously-psy-1830700647
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