I just cleaned the windows to get out of cleaning the inside of my flat 
The sitters are coming the day after tomorrow. I still have to pack my stuff, put everything in its place and clean the flat… so what do I do instead? I clean the windows that (probably) no one besides me realizes are dirty.
What do you do instead of what you’re supposed to do before the sitters (or HOs) arrive?
I am guilty of this if my partner isn’t around to keep me in line! On our last sit he left town before I did so I was prepping for the sitters by myself. During this time I recoiled the garden hose they were never going to touch in a neater way and rearranged some plants and a kitchen shelf.
It all worked out in the end so there were zero lessons learned and I’d do it again 
I like that. Were they happy with your rearrangement?
I wonder what my sitters have done that I would never notice 
And to be honest, I didn’t start with the windows. I started by cleaning a painting. I’m probably coming home and the painting will have cat hair on it 
And of course the cats walked over the painting before I was able to hang it and I had to clean it all over again
Haha I’m confident nobody noticed except me!!
@sihtamilo , as a sitter I do not procrastinate at all when it comes time to prepare for the HO’s arrival. I do not want to be caught short so I start well in advance doing the heavy cleaning, shopping and preparing any food I’m going to leave for them
… Now, in my own life, I procrastinate plenty. It’s actually unsettling to think of what I might have accomplished in life if I hadn’t been a procrastinator. My problem is overthinking things. So often it would have been better to turn off the noise and just do it. When I need to do something I don’t really want to do, I either start eating or go on the computer – or both!
Haha, I can relate! Cleaning the windows is a classic procrastination move. 
Whenever I’m supposed to tidy up before guests arrive, I often find myself reorganizing bookshelves. It’s amazing how creative we can get at avoiding the actual cleaning!
Last time we had sitters I wrote a list of all the cleaning tasks I had to do before they arrived (it included the windows, skirting boards and the oven). Then I decided that baking the house sitters a batch of Anzac biscuits was more important (or maybe just more enjoyable)
As a procrastinator when it comes to the jobs I don’t want to do, here’s a hack I learned that works well for me. Set a timer for 20 minutes and beat the clock to see what I can achieve in that time. 20 minutes is the key, not too short and not too long that I get distracted. I feel a real sense of achievement at the end of 20 minutes that I reward myself with chocolate or wine or looking at my beach view…
@JennyH hahaha I like your thinking! 
@mars Love this - procrastinators of the world unite ……… tomorrow, but I live by the credo “I just love the sound of a deadline whooooshing by”
I wasn’t winning any prizes for tidiness when I was a student. When I absolutely HAD to start prepping for exams, and there was nothing else left to do, I actually started cleaning my apartment rather than studying! I knew there was nothing left after that!
Homework was always for Sunday night, never Friday afternoon @botvot 
#rebel
It WOULD be more important to me (as long as the place had been vacuumed, my sheets were clean & no dirty dishes in the sink!) 
It’s really not procrastinating, but I too have cleaned things because “the sitter is coming” that I rarely get around to cleaning. My home is generally much cleaner since I’ve started using Trusted Housesitters!
I am really not a procrastinator. I agree with Crookie that setting a timer helps. When the 20 minutes are gone, I usually set it for another 20 minutes since I am “on a roll.” Also, doing the task that I least enjoy FIRST is helpful.
Another tip: break the job down into smaller chunks and don’t feel like all of it has to get done in one attempt. I was “home” for 4 years with my children, and I created a schedule for myself so that over the course of each week, the entire house would get cleaned—certain rooms each day of the week. This way, each day only required about 20-30 minutes of cleaning.
Well done you, I really appreciate clean windows, especially if there’s interesting things/wildlife to photograph/video out of those windows.
Hope the time away was good.
That’s probably true for me too. I told my husband we have to go away more often and use THS. That way the appartement gets a thorough cleaning more often 
The 5-Minute Rule is a simple yet effective technique to combat procrastination. It involves committing to work on a task or activity for just five minutes, without the sign language alphabet pressure of completing it entirely within that time frame . The 5-minute rule is one of a number of cognitive behavioral therapy techniques for procrastination. Using the 5-minute rule, you set a goal of doing whatever it is you would otherwise avoid, but you only do it for a set amount of time: five minutes.
My husband’s grandfather told him this and it really helps when I have one thing or a long list of things I don’t feel like doing:
“That which you don’t want to do, do first.”
or
“That which you least want to do, do first.”