I am of an age at which society seems to expect me to apply to colleges.

I developed a strange attraction to the UC system. The system would take applications from November 1st trough 11:59 PM on November 30th. I did a bit of preparation for this, doing things like standardized tests (I got an 800 on the Math IIC and a 750 on the Physics. Okay, sorry, I'm bragging) and thinking about stuffs, but I really did procrastinate pretty hardcore. So, as the deadline raced towards me, and the deadline was visible on the horizen (I'm a little bit nearsighted, this 'horizen' is about a week in front of me), I began to work on the essays. One day during this week, it snowed, and kept me indoors a bit more, all good. Well, suddenly it was November 30th, I had some solid drafts, and I was doing some revision on them.

11:00 PM - Have final drafts of 2 of 3 essays.
11:30 PM - Almost finished with final of the 3rd essay.
11:35 PM - Power outage.

I proceed to flip out. I run upstairs to get a flashlight, and then tear into the storage room to find a UPC. It is freezing. I feel more dumb than I ever have in my life. I find a UPC. Plug-in, realize that I need to reconfigure my network because I'm using a wireless adaptor. The UPC is beeping. I run upstairs, rip the modem of of the wall, and start turning over CD racks looking for the drivers (can't download them off the net).

The UPC is starts beeping faster. It is 11:56 PM.

I am horrified when I see that the UPC has a one bar of battery life left. But I am connected to the web. I log onto the UC website, and am on step 'step 7 of 8' of the application process (I had my progress from earlier in the day on a saved internet application). I copypaste my essays into the some form boxes. I finish the last step (8 of 8) by checking off some 'affidavit' and residency q's, and then hit the submit button. I become ecstatic for a split second, and then it lands on a page asking for my parents credit card number to pay. The UPC is screaming. I am allowed a glimpse of the page for like 10 seconds and then the battery dies. The time is 11:58 PM.

I get a candle and stare at it for awhile, and think about procrastination. I'm not lying about any of this. I have been 'grounded' to think about my procrastination now.