Of my own admission, my planning of most anything could be considered mildly controlled chaos.

The only real positive I can claim from this is, I rarely fail to get anything done and this has been pushed, perhaps more enabled, by earlier successes when I was in high school and college.

My talent, for better or for worse, for doing things at the last minute — like most people — manifested in elementary and high school.

While we’re in the spirit of admission, I should probably say it was a large part of why I was a solid C-average in both high school and college.

So I’m not claiming victory here, only stating that I was never harmed that much by waiting until the last minute to do things.

I’m suddenly very sad about being average. Moving on.

There is an art to arranging your life in such a manner, believe it or not. I relate it to a juggling act on a unicycle going down Mount Everest. The very idea of this method still requires a certain amount of planning: i.e. you need to know where you’re starting on Mount Everest and where you think you might end up.

Let that sink in for a moment. A mountain being conquered on a unicycle. Hijinks!

What I never really understood, or chose to ignore, is that there are a lot of peaks along the way that don’t lend well to downhill travels on a unicycle. And I can’t even ride a unicycle so college especially, was equal parts planning and equal parts: “Hey, that will do in a pinch, let’s go to Jim’s Tap.”

Jim’s Tap was my favorite establishment in Brookings when I was attending South Dakota State University. It’s a legend of sorts right beside Manolis Grocery in Huron, South Dakota, which to this day makes the best sandwich I’ve ever tasted. THE BEST! No, shut-up. There is nothing better.

I only take this segue in my narrative to talk about Jim’s Tap, because Jim’s Tap contributed a lot to my complacency in getting things done.

Jim’s Tap had a distinctive historical feel with swords and battle axes adorning the wall and a couple suits of armor standing guard at certain spots of the main room. A long bar anchored one side of the thin establishment with all sorts of liquors and beers from the US and across the pond.

Out back was a gigantic fire pit centering the patio with plenty of benches to sit.

One didn’t go to Jim’s Tap to get drunk, though … nevermind. Rather, Jim’s was an intellectual sort of place that lent more to having a couple beers with friends, hashing out the trials of the world which in those days rarely got outside of my tight circle of friends and a rogue assignment that I “forgot” about.

So you might ask yourself then, “Eric? If it was an intellectual sort of place, why …”

Shut up, nevermind why I was there.

The connection is that me and my friends spent a lot of time in Jim’s, talking away the night in a pursuit for greater understanding of those things that struck at the heart of who we were — college students. Who didn’t plan real well.

Naturally, we discovered answers to the great secrets of the universe and if the Beatles were overrated or not.

This attitude, fostered only in part by Jim’s and leveraged by a whole a host of other distractions, was and is the primary reason why I don’t plan really well, but still manage to get things done in my own unique style of getting things done.

Of course, as I dove further into my career path of journalism, or as it seems to be blanket classified these days as “Fake News,” my push to be a little better in planning has brought with it the added flare of pressure and stress.

I look at my calendar these days, see all the colors denoting various publications, news or sports and think, “That’s pretty. Why does it make me angry?”

Take the day I’m writing this. It’s Wednesday and there is a touch of my college days, as if I have a paper due in the next three hours. Spotlight needs to be put together, something else I have to do on a very colorfully packed day. To do this, I need to write my column, which I of course for one reason or another that sadly doesn’t involve Jim’s Tap, I’ve waited until the last minute to write.

Which is kind of surreal if you think about it: Writing my column and then explaining to you why I’m writing it this late, while I’m writing it. It’s all very confusing.

I’ll worry about it later.

It’s somewhat ironic though that this far into my career that started in a wildly unorganized way, that I’m now chained to a calendar to get things done.

Does this mean I still don’t suffer from the hiccups of an old life? No, I’m still very capable of waiting until the last minute to get things done and usually at home I see it more than anywhere else.

It’s my nature and whether one agrees with it or not, I’m pretty good at it.

Now, who wants to grab a knightcap?