Give my brain some chores.

February 16, 2019 5:51 AM

Hello, I’m stuck at a tradeshow for the next 4 days, repeating the same thing over and over to people that stop by the booth. Normally when I’m doing something like this I think about all the things I have to do make plans for the future which in turn ramps up my anxiety. I’m looking for fun thought exercises or some things to mull over that will be beneficial to me in some way. Additionally , I’m curious how others function in similar scenarios, what does your brain do when it’s active but your body is stuck in one place?
posted by vividvoltage to Health & Fitness (16 answers total)

Do you play time-traveller? That's a fun mental game, where you think okay, if I got transported suddenly with what I have in my pockets and bag Right Now to the distant past, how would I survive and thrive? Easy mode is the Middle Ages or Ancient Rome, then you try somewhere less familiar like Imperial China, prehistoric caves, Babylon.... wherever you last watched a documentary! It's basically one-person D&D.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 5:55 AM on February 16, 2019 [4 favorites]

I memorize poetry and songs. If you get a good start on it at home, you can then print it out small or load the words to your phone and check it on breaks or surreptitiously when you forget your next line. Eventually you get enough material that you can entertain yourself mentally by recalling it.
posted by blnkfrnk at 6:32 AM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

I make up tunes in my head, either in a serious "Someday this might be a song I sing to someone" way or in a fun "I will have forgotten this in half an hour but right now I'm going to deedle around with it" way.
posted by nebulawindphone at 6:36 AM on February 16, 2019 [1 favorite]

I play buzzword bingo. I used to work at a company that had this "on the train" buzzword, so I kept track of how many times the CEO used it in a meeting. It was over 40. Kept me occupied, was ridiculous, looked like I was taking notes.
posted by Ms Vegetable at 6:40 AM on February 16, 2019 [1 favorite]

I also make lists, but focus on fun ones when I need to distract myself. For example, think of every song your favorite band has that involves aliens, or rank your favorite whatever things.

I also play anagrams with any words in my line of sight pretty much constantly. It's harder in your head, but kind of a fun challenge to keep track of what you've thought of and to keep coming up with new words.
posted by snaw at 7:12 AM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

I plan elaborate dinner parties! With guest list and menus! Decor! Music playlists! (I never actually throw the dinner parties.)
posted by BlahLaLa at 7:34 AM on February 16, 2019

I constantly write stories in my head about the people I see. I imagine their day to day lives, what they do for a living, etc etc etc. (This is also why I don’t mind waiting in airports. SO MUCH material to work with!)
posted by bookmammal at 7:45 AM on February 16, 2019 [4 favorites]

I’m partway through writing a novel, and whenever I have spare brain cycles I noodle with scenes and dialogue in my head. It’s diverting, entertaining, and feels productive. So I suggest you start thinking about a work of short fiction. Come up with a premise and a character and an inciting incident and play out all the possibilities. (It can be as obvious as “A bored person is working at a trade show, and something wonderful/miraculous/terrifying happens.”) At the end of the night write down an outline of the best storyline you came up with. The next day, mentally refine and expand that story. At the end of four days you’ll have written a short story.
posted by ejs at 7:47 AM on February 16, 2019 [3 favorites]

Architecture and interior decoration. I have whole mansions planned out to the smallest tile and carving.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 9:44 AM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

Things I do include making up and solving puzzles, mentally composing letters or lessons for my classes, remembering or imagining conversations, trying to exercise my memory generally (can I reconstruct a mental map of the mall when I was a kid? can I remember the names and something about all the people I lived with in college?), etc.

If you're at all kindly disposed toward math, it can be an endless source of mental diversions. You can start with a classic puzzle, then fiddle with it to make new puzzles out of thin air.

For example, there's a puzzle that asks, Can you cover a chessboard (8×8) with dominoes (1×2), leaving only two opposite corner squares uncovered? I won't spoil the answer, but once you solve that, you can try changing which squares must be left uncovered, or change the dominoes to some other shape. Which Tetris pieces can tile a chessboard? L-shaped tiles that cover 3 squares can't do it, since 3 doesn't go into 64, but can we use them to cover all but one square? All but any one specified square?

You don't even necessarily need a classic puzzle to start the gears turning -- a lot of patterns are in plain sight. The square numbers go 1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100. Look at the last digits: do you see a pattern? What happens if you add 1+3+5+7+...? You might know the "knuckle rule" for multiples of 9 -- what happens for multiples of 9 past 90? Multiples of 11 all have two of the same digit up to 99; is there a pattern that continues beyond that point?
posted by aws17576 at 9:50 AM on February 16, 2019

I’ve had various “babysit the trade fair booth for 8 hours” jobs in my life. Things I’ve done to occupy my mind:

People watch. I remember this one exercise I had to do as kid where you’d look at people’s shoes walking by and guess what they’d look and act like based on just that info. Then you’d look up and see how right/wrong you were. Supposed to be an exercise in examining your own biases.

In lighter fare, top 10, 20, 100 lists. Rank the top 10 films I saw this year, or my top 15 characters on TV sitcoms, or top ten burger joints in the city. Give justification for each, and see what that says about me.

The usual daydreaming happens often, but it’s more fun when it’s wildy fantastical. Imagining if I’d grown up to run a B&B in SE Asia, or
the whirlwind story of suddenly getting cast in a movie that won me a Best Actor Oscar.

More realistically, I also have a couple of stories I’ve been working on, turning them into short writing pieces.

All when I’m not trying to figure out what I’m gonna say differently when the next person walks over to my booth.
posted by galleta monster at 10:12 AM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

In groups of strangers, it can be fun to try to guess how things would play out if it suddenly turned into an emergency situation. Who would cower in the corner? Who would surprise everyone by being super pragmatic? If you had to organize everyone ("you, guard the perimeter") how would you do it?
posted by salvia at 10:29 AM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

In my spare brain time, I like to come up with roller derby names for all of the people I know. In case you are unfamiliar, these are puns based on their names that make them sound really badass.
posted by oxisos at 1:13 PM on February 16, 2019

Ah trade shows. So mind numbing yet so necessary for certain industries. I hope that your company is practical and you have a coworker staffing the booth with you, in case there are multiple people to talk to or if you need to take a bathroom break. I usually just chat with whoever I’m there with.

If that is not your situation, try doing origami with pretty paper. Practice before so you can do it without instruction. It’s little quick steps so you can check around and not accidentally ignore someone approaching, and then you can give the people who come a little souvenir of your booth. IME people really like this, far more than a cheap branded pen or keychain or whatever. Little puff star shapes are good, as are cranes once you get the hang of them. You can line up the completed ones on your table, and hand people one along with your card or whatever else you’re handing out as takeaways.
posted by ananci at 1:58 PM on February 16, 2019 [2 favorites]

I do this, like I claim sanctuary, with interior design!

What I find myself thinking about are places I have been, remember well, or can currently see: what's in front of me, a friend's house, rooms in my own home.

Things I'll tend to think about: what objects could transform it? What different color and textile combinations would be interesting? How could I make it look/become X, given Y constraint? (ie, how could I make this tiny, narrow room with doors on both sides and a sloping ceiling look like a comfortable and livable place for 4-5 people to listen to records in?)

It's like a soothing beauty puzzle for my brain.
posted by moons in june at 2:08 PM on February 16, 2019 [1 favorite]

I try to find all the letters of the alphabet, in order! For this, I would allow name badges, tote bags everything. Then do it again! P.S. this is great for church bulletins. :)
posted by kinsey at 6:15 PM on February 16, 2019 [1 favorite]