How do you pass the time on weekends?

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I hate weekends. The loneliness and boredom.

For those of you who aren't married with families, how do you pass the time?

What!? The week actually has an end? If it weren't for the sun, I wouldn't be able to tell there were different days. As it is, I can't ever remember which one it is without looking at a reminder.


I've added a couple new tattoos to the tops of my thighs recently to pass the time... Problem is, eventually I'll run out of space on the areas I can comfortably reach...

I used to read a lot, play a lot of games, go out for a bike ride, go visit my mum, take the dog out. Get a hobby, watch a bunch of films or something. Maybe you could volunteer or something, just for an hour or two. Maybe can shake that lonely feeling. There's always the Wrong Planet chatroom.

I've spent most of this weekend so far talking to my new best buddy who I am ridiculously grateful for.

Dog walking. Reading, writing and figuring stuff out.

My wife has fibromyalgia (sp?) so it is usually spent helping her out to minimize her pain around the house.
But we try and make time for day trips just to get out of the house.

Mostly I would go out with friends to the cinema or to drink. Sometimes we went to a bar where they played live music, that was very cool (Queen and Rush covers). Sometimes we go to concerts. Once I also went with my mother to an exhibition (Martisse), those are also cool.. The last exhibition I went was of Mark Chagall and it was great! I have few friends. I even don´t care of going to the cinema alone, I think it is fun too. Reading fiction is an option if you´re alone. At my city some people gather in the weekends to go to a bicycle ride through the city. It is a nice program to go if you don´t have friends to go out since everyone is welcomed to join.

Last edited by Wedge on 27 Mar 2010, 3:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Most weekends, I worry that I might waste my time and not feel satisfied that I had a good weekend if I do one thing or another. So I don't do any of those things. I end up completely wasting the weekend because I was worried that I would waste it. I have a habit of creating exactly the situation I most fear.

Maybe one key to doing something interesting with your time off is to give yourself one easy and enjoyable thing to accomplish each weekend. Try to do it early in the weekend so you know that you at least did one fun thing. Sometimes the satisfaction of doing that first thing will give you energy to do another fun thing.

In a sense, having fun can be hard work. You have to set yourself a goal. Sometimes you have to do some work in advance such as writing a list of things you might like to do. It is important to get yourself into situations where you are likely to be interested and engaged in some activity.

It is very easy to get stuck in a rut. (I've been in a bad rut for a few years now) I think ruts generally occur because you can't think of anything else to do. But it is hard to think of things you don't normally think about so you need to create a situation that adds an element of randomness to your life. If you like road trips, you can take out a map and randomly pick a location and drive there. If you like weird old stuff, find an antique store, preferably one you've never been to, and go there just to look around. The key is to circumvent your habits. Do something you wouldn't normally do. Go watch a movie that is different from your usual tastes. Eat at a restaurant you've never been to. Do one of the things that someone suggests on this thread, no matter how boring it sounds.

My immediate reaction to my own advice is to get anxious at having to do something I am not familiar with. Don't put yourself into a situation that is very stressful, but push yourself into the unknown a little.

So what am I doing this weekend? I have wasted a lot of time in the past few years, but last weekend, although I worried that it would be yet another project that I start, but never finish, I shot an interview for a documentary which I started editing today. This afternoon, I am invited to some friend's house for dinner. I'm afraid there might be someone there that I don't know, but I'll go anyway. I'll probably do some photography and go for a bike ride tomorrow. This is a huge amount more than I usually do. I am hoping I can keep up the momentum rather than sinking back into boredom and sloth.

I got too many kids to have spare time usually, but weekends they're not here (like now) I relax in my comfy chair and blow the crap out of people with an M16.

So buy an Xbox.

I usually just sit on the computer all day. Sometimes I see friends though.

A couple of hours walking in two different parks helps. Getting Chinese food... NOT over the phone. Walking to the ocean sometimes...

It's not "rational", but our brains react positively to grass, trees, and fresh air, while there's no logical "reason" to do so. It's just scenery, after all. But it helps nonetheless.

I do know how you feel, though :\

For me, this generally works more early in the day on Saturday.

For the evening, I sometimes make it back home relatively early like 6:00 or 7:00 with a combo of projects. I'll have projects purely on the fun side, like videos from the library and Blockbuster. I'll have medium-fun/medium-intellectual projects like responding on WrongPlanet and on other sites (and I'd really like to find a good movie site if you can recommend one), perhaps a little essay writing, a little speech practice, ever so occasionally some fiction writing, which I'd like to do more of. And then I'll have projects which are more solidly on the intellectual side. For example, lately I've been getting interested in medicine and considering going into medical journalism. So, for example, I might have both John Barry's excellent book "The Great Influenza" (1918 was an outlier event, just a question of how much of an outlier) and a section in a relatively recent biology textbook from Half-Price Books. So, I'll move between all this projects as the feeling strikes me. Sometimes it a lot of fun, I'll watch some of a fun movie, seriously study soe, watch some more of a fun movie, seriously study. Or, perhaps at 11:30 I'll find myself in the midst of a writing project I really want to finish that night and I'll end up staying up later than I had initially planned to, and that's kind of neat, too.

Sometimes I do homework for my classes (trying to avoid that this weekend), catch up on books I'm reading (almost always reading something), go mess around with my horse, mess around on the computer. All of my friends live out of town so I do stuff with my family if I want to spend time with people. If I wanted to keep more busy I would get a part time job or volunteer somewhere, but I spend a lot of time on schoolwork.

all the days are the same to me, the only demarcations are that the weekdays have schoolbuses and school children i must avoid, and damned vehicle traffic and overall business in general. so the weekends are reserved for errands that enable me to get from point A to B with as little intervening traffic as possible. i stay home monday through friday.

I work on "weekends" (Sat & Sun.); my days off each week vary from month to month.

Have you thought about volunteering for a charity (IE: a Red Cross blood donation center) on Saturdays? I used to work for Hannah's Socks on Saturdays--either distributing or sorting & counting socks--most of last year. Very interesting "job"! What about volunteer work at your local library with literacy programs (either reading or computer)?

Otherwise, on my days off, I try to get caught up on my housework (an endless task!), putter around in the yard (Spring is especially busy, what with Winter's damage to clean up) & my favorite activity--getting caught up on my sleep! (I also have sleep apnea, so I NEVER get enough sleep.) Summertime is also a good time to get out & go to fairs & festivals--good food & a GREAT place to people-watch!

I taught myself to crochet in high school, & my Nana taught me to knit when I was maybe in 2nd grade. I spend a lot of winter weekends doing needlework (hats, scarves & slipper socks along with the occasional sweater &/or pr of mittens) while "rotting my brain" in front of the TV--usually something educational such as Discovery, History, Science, NatGeo, Animal Planet (I see it as getting caught up on stuff I missed during my high school & college days).

Of course, there's always the internet--either just surfing or on-line gaming. A friend of mine is a member of Second Life; an alternate reality site. She says it's a great way to take on a totally different identity. In real life, she's a tomboy & mother of 3; in that game, she's a single BDSM dominatrix. In real life, I'm a very average-looking female. On that site, I'm a scrumptiously handsome male who has a pet dragon.

Even in pre-internet days, I found interesting things to do on my days off. Since I grew up out in the country, I taught myself to identify edible wild plants (Euwell Gibbons's "Stalking the Wild Asparagus" was a great inspiration) & how to "read" animal tracks--a la "ManTracker". I also practiced my favorite sport--target shooting with a .22 cal rifle.

There's plenty to do out there--it's up to you to find it & do it.

I usually do housecleaning on Saturdays in the morning. Then, I try to do something fun with my son in the afternoon like watch a movie or out for lunch.
I love to cook so usually on Sundays, I plan a nice dinner and cook and/or relax.

Becoming a NASCAR fan has helped. There's so much racing programming on during an average weekend that it keeps me occupied. Also, since I am currently between marriages, the high point of my week is quality time with my deck, usually on weekend evenings, which includes whatever I am currently reading, a really good cigar, and a glass of single malt scotch. Before I know it, it's Monday again.