Crowdsourcing Boredom Busters for Social Distancing

[Sam W]

Hey all,

So, given how many of us are social distancing or otherwise finding ourselves unexpectedly at home rather than school or work, I thought it might help to get a thread going of things people like doing or find helpful when at home. Netflix and other movie/TV services are a big one, but as someone who spends a lot of time at home due to working from home and living somewhere rural, I know firsthand that at some point the brain starts craving something else. Here are some of my preferred activities.

-Crafting: It keeps your hands busy, and creating something is very satisfying. I will likely order a new embroidery pattern, because I find that soothing and I often come up with good ideas when doing it. Which leads me too...

-Making art: It doesn't have to be good art, but making stuff is fun and feels satisfying. That can be painting, writing that short story/fanfic/blog you've been thinking of, practicing make-up techniques, and so on.

-Crosswords or other puzzles: I'm a huge fan of Queer Crosswords, where you can make a small donation to an LGBTQA charity and get digital access to some really fun crosswords.

-Discovering new music: When I was in college and holed up with a flu, I did a deep dive into the music recommendations of Spotify and my friend who has very cool taste in music. Like, just spent an evening laying on my bed and getting super caught up in listening to awesome new sounds.

-Utilize your local library's online resources: If you didn't stock up on books, libraries still have a ton of free resources to offer you. Lots have e-books, and databases like Overdrive even have things like graphic novels. Some libraries also have streaming services like Kanopy, if you're looking for a new source of movies.

-Check out livefeeds from zoos and aquariums: The Monterey Bay Aquarium has cameras on all their main exhibits, and I know some places (like the Cincinnati Zoo) are hosting educational streams since the zoo has to close. EDITED TO ADD: Someone put together a schedule of these, which is awesome: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... ya/pubhtml.

-Binge-read Scarleteen: We have twenty-one years worth of articles on here. That can keep a person occupied for quite a while.

Those are just some ideas I have. How about y'all?

[0PT1M15T1C]

- For me, what I enjoy doing is setting up a workout, this kind of looks like 1 minute of sprints, 50 pushups, 1 minute plank, 100 sit-ups - repeat. Sometimes I add in burpees but not always because I find I get lightheaded going high to fast and repeatedly. All of that can be changed around though, but it’s most commonly what we do at the gym for soccer.

- I also think video games are pretty great, I plan to play a little mine craft with my brother, maybe some rocket league, whatever we find interesting. ARK is a good one!

- I love what Sam mentioned about articles because I’ll get bored and search for a random keyword and just surf those articles.

- I put up some cute decorations in my room and reorganized some things

- Pets, that’s always nice, to be sure I’m taking good care of them too.

- And finally, FaceTime! I have a phone and I’m going to use it, I plan to still be communicating with friends.

[Amanda F]

I'm going to catch up on the stack of books I've been meaning to read! This year I set myself a 20 in 2020 reading challenge. Right now I'm four books into my 20, so I bet I can get ahead.

[thewrit3r]

I know I’ll be spending a loooot of screen time because classes are moved online (and hopefully work!) so it’s nice to see some offline suggestions here!
-I also want to catch up on reading. Audiobooks are also a great option for reading alternatives, especially if you’re more of an audio than visual person
-I’ll probably start coloring again. I loved doing it as a kid and now there are all these apps/coloring books for adults because they’ve realized the benefits (plus it’s just plain fun!)
-Along with crafts I’m trying to rework my sewing machine, which is at least 10 years old but I haven’t used it in forever because me and technology don’t always get along... but it’s worth a shot and actually pretty fun figuring out how to work it again
-This is definitely not fun for some people but I find cleaning up when I’m restless gets my mind off things and feels good. Any sort of movement really helps me (which reminds me I need to get back to exercising)
-Depending on where you live/how far away you are from neighbors, you could walk outside. Again this is based on location and several other factors but I thought I’d throw it out there in case anyone could do so. Or just sitting in front of a window and soaking up some good Vitamin D

[Mo]

I'm going to try and get back into baking bread, which I got into for a while a few years back but didn't keep up with. I find cooking/baking pretty relaxing so I'm looking forward to taking some extra time to work on some food projects.
A good friend of mine is looking into organizing some remote group activities like watching stuff together with a shared chat room and playing Jackbox games remotely, and I'm excited to see what plans she comes up with.

[0PT1M15T1C]

I hope it's okay I add a few more!

Social distancing doesn't mean you can't find ways to help people out in your community, especially those who may be more vulnerable or may need a little extra support during this time. For a lot of communities there are still ways to reach out, and I want to mention a few. So, online I find there's often community facebook groups, and I'm still involved in my old one just because I suck at using Facebook, but I've found that so many people are willing to help out. If you're able to, maybe checking out those online groups and seeing if anyone is posting they need help, this could be anything from supporting with getting groceries, or for me, we'll usually have a few snowfalls around this time of year so helping out by shovelling, doing little check ups to make sure people are okay. My mom and I definitely keep close tabs on that, and I know there's on older man that would do a walk in the summer and would always stop by and talk to my dad, so we're keeping a close eye and trying to see if we can find him and see if he needs anything. Still, be careful doing so and keep a distance, don't put others at risk.

Right now where I live, there's a massive push towards programming and my mom I guess joined a hackers group (that's what they call it, really it's just people learning or who understand coding, to create resources). In my city, there is call to create some platforms or I'm not quite sure what to call them to connect people to help that they need and such, as well as just creating fun online things to do. Maybe seeing if there's something like that where you can be involved in a group like that and help create things would be an option. One thing my mom and I kind of discussed was that there are a lot of people out of work right now, and quite a few areas include taking care of people - since not everyone who *should* be at the hospital may be able to go if this gets bad, those people would be easy to train for check ups, maybe at home care. I don't know exactly how that would work, but it's not a bad idea honestly.

I know the Pride Centre in my city has brought their groups online, and so I started doing that. If that's of interest to you, contacting your centre may be a good idea, ours is through discord.

Again with the whole helping out in your community, volunteering, I don't know how other places are handling it but just because we have this virus doesn't mean there aren't still people who are at risk of other things or experiencing homelessness, so I've been looking at ways to get involved that way. If you're younger (I'm 15) you may have to have a parent do it with you, so it's definitely something to weigh and discuss, don't take it lightly, you don't want to put anyone at risk. I consider this primarily because I'm a low risk person, and it's something I plan to discuss at length with my family. Also, I worry about our first nations youth who may already not have a stable home during this time, who I know are particularly at risk for things like abuse and other issues - so looking into that sort of thing and seeing what may be helpful, I go to a school where we actually have a cultural liaison, and a high indigenous population so it is often talked about where I go to school. It may also be a good time to really dive into researching about other communities.

For me, I have people in my life who if they contract this virus, they won't be able to pull through, for example, I have a great grandmother in a nursing/care home who is living in the late stages of dementia, so my whole family is looking into ways to communicate, or I guess just "be around her" from a distance, because she doesn't communicate. For example, this kind of looks like seeing if we can get set up on her TV and just let her feel like she's around people that care about her. With other family, it looks a lot like doing FaceTime or joining games online. I think we all know -or may be at higher risk yourself- someone who can't get this virus, and so definitely reaching out and continuing to communicate with the ones you love is a big deal right now.

I've been reading a lot of articles from Scarleteen as has been mentioned, so now all I'm doing is really questioning just how strange the people helping me out with issues here are. It certainly seems like there are some interesting personalities and I love that more than anyone knows, partly because it gives me weird things to bug my mom with.

[nerdyqueen32]

I've been reading a lot (both books and fanfic). I have a massive stash of books I need to read to I've been slowly working my way through those.

I'm also trying to clean my room a lot, since I'm spending a lot more time in it. I found a book of poetry from first grade the other day, which was very wholesome.

Trying to get some movement has also been helpful. I really like Yoga with Adriene because there's a whole bunch for anxiety/stress.

Masturbate. You are your own safest sex partner. (just wash your hands. In general, and here specifically)

Binge-read Scarleteen articles.

A lot of art museums have online tours on google maps(? I think). Visit the met without leaving your couch!

Talk to your friends! FT or zoom calls etc. (Zoom has been upgrading a ton of my meetings for free for unlimited minutes which is very lovely)

Cooking! I've been trying to make meals, since I'm home and have more free time around lunch.

[GenHenkston]

I often spend that time riding my bike.
Also, I made repairs in my apartment, and I'm so glad about it! Practiced my vocals classes
Read 5 books
Watched Netflix
And I should admit, that it was a very productive time for me

[Siân]

So in England we've just gone into a new lockdown and I've been making my lockdown plan. The last three posts have already hit on some of my top ideas, but things I'm looking forward to doing include:

Do things that me feel connected to "something bigger": OPT1M15T1C had a great bunch of ideas up-thread for giving back to community. For me it's volunteering here at Scarleteen, reaching out to my more immediate community and looking around for additional things I'd like to be part of.

Ride my bike: Exercise is so vital for my physical and mental health, I plan to spend a lot of my time out on my bike since it's outdoors and away from crowds, plus join an online yoga class my friend runs and generally look after my body.

Masturbate: nerdyqueen32 already pointed out that I am my own safest sex partner. All that money I'm not spending on dinners out or climbing gym memberships? Gonna get myself some new toys and spend time exploring and seeing what feels good since there are always new discoveries to make!

Nest: Spending a lot of time at home makes me even more invested in keeping it a nice place to be. I've been slowly creating a jungle by propagating my plants, have happy things all over my walls which I'm adding to and also making the effort to keep it clean and tidy.