It is a truth moderately well acknowledged that drugs and sex make good
bedfellows. This is coming from my personal experience of dabbling in several
categories of mind-altering substances and I am here to tell you in my personal experience at least, the most remarkable drug and sex combo mega-deal is not ket or coke but plain old weed.

Yes, my friends, when it comes to sex, bud is your buddy. In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that weed is far from my drug of choice. In fact I sometimes experience crippling paranoia if I inhale more than one drag of
the stuff; what I like to call ‘sensory-hyperawareness’. I am certain that humans just aren’t meant to think so much. It leads to an influx of irrational, paranoid thoughts, ranging from wondering whether the way I’m holding my head looks weird to imagining crowds of people watching me whilst I pee (in the securely locked bathroom of a house). Another scary thing is the slowing down of time. I was convinced that I had been sitting on the toilet peeing for at least half an hour, only to discover that the cigarette my friend was holding for me was still lit upon my return.

The only, and I mean only, redeeming feature of this whole thing is having sex whilst stoned. These negative effects don’t always have to stay so negative. Stoned sex is a whole different ball game. My most recent experience of stoned sex happened a couple of months ago. I was in the living room of my then new-ish boyfriend’s house, a ‘phat doob’ was beginning to make its way around those assembled. This was back when the paranoia for me was more hit and miss. Before long, however, I began to feel the symptoms of paranoia and the intense self-consciousness and hyper-awareness set in. I became irrationally convinced that all my lovely boyfriend’s lovely friends hated
me and thought I was ridiculous.

After stewing there for about an hour (that was really probably only about ten minutes), I quietly suggested that we go to bed. After having negotiated the stairs (Am I walking too slowly? Will it look weird if I hold the bannister? Will they think I’ve forgotten how to walk properly, like I’m a giant toddler?!
Oh God what are they laughing about? They’re laughing at me aren’t they? I know they are!), we finally reached the sanctuary of his room.

Physical intimacy came as a welcome distraction from all the horrible thoughts. But it was more than merely that. I existed no longer just inside my own head, but in my fingertips, my thighs, my nipples. It turned out the hyper-awareness was not just a negative. It applied to my sense of touch as well and all of a sudden the paranoia dissipated and I was having really, really great sex. It was like the nerve-endings all over my skin had multiplied tenfold and were all tingling at once. And the elongation of time thing is really much more welcome when you happen to be having an orgasm.

“Hi! Good Morning! Sorry to bother you, my name’s Charlie and I’m just calling round on behalf of your local Labour Party. I was just wondering if you planned to vote in the General Election on 7th May or not?”
That’s how I normally start my canvassing spiel. Everyone I’ve ever gone campaigning with has had their own style though, with some people preferring a more formal approach or a more direct one. Or usually a less suffocatingly enthusiastic one.

Whenever my friends ask me about my canvassing experiences (which isn’t very often, I promise – they’re generally either armchair politicians or don’t care), I tell them people are friendlier than you’d think, which is sort of true.
You do get people who react with hostility to you probably waking them up at 11am on a Sunday and you do get people who support other parties thinking they can mess with you. But for every negative experience, there’s usually a voter who seems to be genuinely moved by the fact that someone would come and knock on their door on a rainy, cold Wednesday evening and talk about the state of the country with them. Or at least is good at pretending that they are so moved. And if there isn’t, then I find the electorate normally find some other way of being entertaining anyway.

Every seasoned campaigner, for example, will have had a dead serious conversation about pot-holes, or income tax, or hedgerows with a naked person. Regardless of weather, or time of day, topless men are so common they don’t even register with me any more.

A friend of mine spoke at great length to an elderly and stark naked man about tuition fees, while on another occasion a different friend was greeted at the door by a semi-dressed woman, who subsequently invited him in.
In amongst all this, I have my own way of entertaining myself. Over the last few months I’ve been slowly but surely adding to my list of people with animal surnames that I’ve canvassed. At home, I knocked on the doors of the Fox, Squirrel and Bear households. A few weeks ago I asked how a Mr Llama might be voting, and only the other day I phone-canvassed an entire household of Lambs. You do come across some fantastic names when you’re out and about finding voter ID, and a particularly silly one is always a welcome morale booster.

My experience with campaigning is also that, no matter how well you plan, the unexpected is always lurking around the corner. There are an infinite number of letters and signs that help you record various responses onto the campaign sheets, and yet every now and then you’ll get data you don’t know how to record.

I led a group last weekend, and a fellow canvasser knocked on the door of an elderly woman, who we thought was registered as having a postal vote. She said she suffered from memory loss though, and couldn’t remember if she had already sent off her ballot or not. It was a humbling experience.
The evidence shows campaigning does make a difference in who will win – just ask Oxford East MP Andrew Smith, who won in 2005 thanks in large to his team of volunteers. Talking to people face to face helps the voters and the party understand the issues at hand and gives candidates the chance to be as receptive as possible to their electorate.

But campaigners too stand to gain a lot from speaking to people like that elderly woman. Especially those who spend the rest of their time in the bubble that is Oxford.

Oxford is a place full of opinion. And as that fatal Election Day draws closer, opinions are ubiquitous. The problem? With opinions, comes conflict. And if you’re not careful, you will find yourself on the wrong side of the metaphorical battle-shield. But that’s okay. Because once more, I’m here. And once more, I’ve got a fool-proof resolution.

The first thing to know is that the support of political parties is a lot like supporting a football team. When you’re watching a political debate on TV, the umms and aahs, and the interspersion of indignation and celebration, are much like a Man City vs Man United match. Just like football, support is a badge of honour. You must not offend someone’s badge of honour.

And, just like football, often the support is a pleasant imbalance between arbitrary selection and forceful following. But that makes it even more dangerous.There are several league teams, but really the fans are all the same. So the advice is a happy generalisation.

Firstly, be careful not to say too much. If two opposing supporters chat to each other, they might work you out. Instead, you’re going to need to do a lot of nodding. This will assure them that you think they are clever and correct. Try raising your eyebrows expressively during lengthy rants. I would recommend achieving an expressively sincere and understanding vibe with your eyebrows. If you don’t parallel them in their voting choices, you will need to be prepared to respond to questions about who you are voting for.

Generally diversion tactics are incredibly fruitful. I find a handy line to use is often “Is that a dodo!? The extinct, flightless bird, whose scientific name is raphus cucullatus?” Whilst they are looking for said dodo, slip away. Be stealthy.

If the friend becomes suspicious at any time, the easiest remedy is to make a joke about UKIP. UKIP stands for the ‘United Kingdom’s Idiotic Party’, and consists of a team of extremely bitter white men who probably don’t like puppies, but definitely do like elevating anything made of that superior gilded British ingredient.

“Might just vote UKIP lol,” or, “Ha I met someone who is voting UKIP the other day! What an imbecile.” This will eradicate all tension into nervous revulsion and giggles. If the person responds by explaining that they are in fact going to vote UKIP, then please don’t bother sending me letters of complaint. For if they respond by saying they are a UKIP supporter, then there ceases to be a problem.

Because at that point they cease to be your friend. And although this might create a miserably awkward environment, that’s not for this week’s advice column.

As I scroll through my Facebook newsfeed, I see someone has linked an article entitled ‘10 Reasons Why This Generation is Losing the Ability To Be in Love’. Regrettably, I click on it. What I am greeted with is 1391 words on why our generation is a mess. (That is, apart from the writer of course, who knows what’s what).

The claim? We don’t understand love any more, and are moving away from those healthy “conventional takes on romantic, loving relationships”. Fittingly, the article begins with a heterosexual couple sitting in a field, the man looking off into the distance as the woman rests her head on his back. How sweet. 

And so I reach number one on why we can’t feel anymore:

1. We care more about instant gratification than anything else. Interesting. If we want food we order or go out. This confused me a little, as I am very used to observing students lugging Tesco or Sainsbury’s bags back to their respective homes. But I must be wrong. Put your saucepans away, you won’t be using them. If we are bored, we only turn to phone apps. And if we need directions then we ask our phone. To get places this is infinitely more effective, but apparently that is just simply not the point. It’s not the point because these modes of instant gratification, which may seem helpful, actually seep into our love lives. Like a disease. He doesn’t say how, but they do. 

2. We’ve built a culture driven by drugs and booze. Okay, yes, some of us like to drink and/or dabble. But apparently they are our medication. We turn to substances. And these are love’s “worst enemy”. Because they give us the illusion of an alternate reality. In this reality, we believe our emotions are “heightened”. Hangovers are not for complaining about our antics, they are the weight of believing we are absent from a superior substance reality where we can love greater. Oh Gin, let me escape to my portal of love once more. 

However, the author knows the reality. And he tells us that oh no, this is not love. 

3. We sleep around a lot. Okay. Most individuals have “multiple partners every year”. The author likes sex, he confirms, but having sex outside of a relationship only makes you feel “empty”. Nope, it’s not liberating. All it does is make you feel alone. AND worse than that, it stops you from finding love. You are not just wasting your time having sex, when you could be searching for your soul mate, but you are turning sex into a SPORT. And when that happens, ”Good luck trying to make love.” Because once you’ve slept around, sex stops being special ever. It is “trivial”. You will never love. You will start going to ‘sex’ practice, and buy a metaphorical sex racket, and you will be alone. “Good luck”. (That’s nice that he wishes you luck though.)

4. We’re becoming even more egocentric. He admits this is part of human nature, but the problem is nowadays we are failing to feel empathy. Relationships, he points out, are a lot like communities. And when we are so self-obsessed, how are we meant to be successfully in a relationship? 

5. We date for the sake of dating. Apparently this is a 2000s thing. No, Austen, get back in your grave, you are wrong. There was no compulsive courting, no desperation to get daughters married. Nope, it’s only now that dating has become excessive. It’s not just sex that’s a sport. So is dating. And it’s stopping us from finding love. 

6. We aren’t fans of compromises. He doesn’t really explain why or when we apparently evolved to this state, but we have. And in a relationship we are just as greedy and narrow-minded.

7. We believe in fairytale endings. Apparently Disney was the beginning of fairy tales. And that taught us what love is. But this is giving us “incredibly inaccurate” expectations. Cinderella getting a carriage from a pumpkin? Guys, it’s just not going to happen. We are doomed to question our love, when we can’t ever achieve walking off into the sunset in our tiaras. 

8: We’ve been fooled into believing perfection is attainable. We are all looking for someone perfect, and to be perfect. Sure, perfection can be pretty desirable. But when did that become an issue specifically of our generation?

9. We’re goal-driven, and often forget our partners. Another claim which astounds me in its impressive lack of examples. We do not understand what is valuable. Instead, we put off finding someone to love until everything else is 100 per cent tickedy-boo. (Whilst still somehow managing to adhere to 5. and dating manically). He isn’t “sure why no one realises finding a partner is the most importance piece of the puzzle”. The puzzle of life that is. Drop your ambitions. First you need to be settled in love, THEN you can write that novel, research ion-imaging photo dissociation dynamics, or go travelling. Duh.

And the happy conclusion? 

10. Most of us are really bad at loving. It turns out we can’t get a grasp on love. And if we can’t understand it, we will never be happy. He fails to point out that there is no single type of love, and its complexity, elusiveness and individuality between person and people is the most wonderful thing about it. 

A final footnote: Perhaps my sardonicism is a tad too harsh. Or perhaps it’s encouraging that this list does not hysterically strike my (ever diminishing) heart. I’m too busy happily feeling emotions, and I am pretty damned sure I am not the anomaly on this.

Slumped in my chair, dreary-eyed and facing my computer, my essay title glares back at me. It’s been two hours since I typed it into an empty Word document, and nothing has been added since. In that time, I’ve reorganised my entire collection of notes. I’ve written three to-do lists. I’ve made coffee – properly, in a cafetière. But as the clock ticks me closer to my deadline, I know I’m just making life more difficult for myself. So why is it so impossible to start? 

Procrastination is a chronic condition of the modern world. Professor Piers Steel of the Haskayne School of Business at the University of Calgary found that 95 per cent of us procrastinate at some point – putting off everything from Christmas shopping to paying the bills. Students are perhaps the worst offenders: with so much free time and so many deadlines it’s an easy trap to fall into. 

Contrary to popular belief, procrastinators show no differences in their ability to estimate time or plan. They are well aware of how much time they have left, or how they should manage their workload, but there is simply a mental barrier to getting started. Dr Ferrari, Associate Professor of Psychology at De Paul University in Chicago, explains it well, “Telling someone who procrastinates to buy a weekly planner is like telling someone with chronic depression to just cheer up.” 

No one is born a procrastinator. It is an indirectly learnt trait that often results from a particular upbringing. Authoritarian parenting styles are particularly likely to elicit such a response. Controlling parents can prevent their children from developing the ability to regulate themselves, or simply cause them to rebel. 

Under these conditions, however, procrastinators often turn to their friends for support, who may be tolerant of their excuses and hence reinforce the trait. 

But not all procrastinators are created equal. Dr Ferrari identifies three categories of procrastination, of which you may find yourself slotting into a few. Thrill-seekers enjoy the rush they get from completing work under a tight, last-minute schedule. Avoiders have such a fear of failure and what others will think of them and because of it, they actually seek the impaired work that procrastinating will bring them. They would rather people think they lack effort than ability. Decisional procrastinators just can’t make a decision and not doing so saves them from responsibility for the outcome of events. 

Ultimately, however, the reason we procrastinate is to avoid a certain amount of pain – be it the unpleasantness of spending a night reading chapters of a dull book, or watching the money drain from your bank account as you pay your bills. Procrastinating allows us to enter a comfort zone with instant gratification, and often this is all it takes to dominate the rational part of our mind that knows it would be best to get the work over with. 

While the odd essay crisis after an extended binge on Netflix is normal and most likely expected, chronic procrastination can have serious impacts on your health. Procrastinating university students show evidence of compromised immune systems, gastrointestinal problems and insomnia. 

The problems can even extend to others. Shifting the burden of responsibility onto your peers breaks down relationships and can have dire consequences for teamwork. 

Although procrastination is virtually a fact of life, it can be overcome by relatively simple strategies. Breaking down your work into smaller chunks is usually the first step and is one of the easiest ways to make a task feel more manageable. The added gratification of succeeding in meeting each of your deadlines is a great motivator and can make the end of a project feel more tangible. Beating procrastination can often require a change in attitude, too. For those who use the excuse of perfectionism, it is important to learn to accept that it is okay if things aren’t perfect and realise that a completed task, even if it didn’t turn out exactly how you’d like, is infinitely better than nothing at all. 

One thing all procrastinators can benefit from is trying to focus on the success and positive feelings that are achieved on completing a task. There is no doubt that a night out following a completed essay feels a whole lot better than trying to enjoy yourself with the niggling fear of a rapidly impending deadline. Changing such seemingly hard-wired behaviour takes work, but it is certainly not impossible. There is, however, one thing to remember in all this: you can’t procrastinate forever.