Hey there,
There’s really just a few for me, that I’ve developed in the last year of living on my own.
Nearly every night, I sit on the railing of my veranda and smoke a Lucky, either listening to Counting Crows’ “Up All Night (Frankie Miller Goes to Hollywood)” on my iPod, or throwing up the windows of my room and put on a song from Bruce Springsteen’s “Live in New York” DVD on the stereo.
Any tips?
The first two cuts on that CD/DVD are my “never-fail, gotta get pumped up before class” selections. I’ll drop the DVD into the player, crank it up as loud as it gets, and just rock until the kids get there and we have to start class.
Afternoon coffee. There comes a point, after lunch and all of the post-lunch fallout, when you have to sit back down and start working again. I can’t ever do it without a great big cup of coffee with milk to help get me going. I feel pretty tragic if I try to do without.
I’m not sure if I’m reading this right - you’re a teacher, waiting for the kids? 
I love the first side, but Lost in the Flood on the second side always gets me.
When I’m really existentially extratopical, I’ll listen to the song “Suicide is Painless” from the movie soundtrack of MAS*H. (The version with words). I’ll play it either 3 times, or if it’s really been heavy, 9 times.
Lights need to be off, but a lava lamp or glitter light or a candle may flicker in the background. Or the disco lights in the hot tub can be on. No talking!!
It’s a ritual left over from my college days.
Yep. Many times my students have gotten to 1st period early and found their teacher wailing on air guitar along with Bruce, Steven and Nils. I actually got a couple of them hooked on good, as opposed to recent, music this way.
Althought nothing weirds them out more than entering my classroom and finding Bob Marley or Funkadelic blasting on the boombox. 
Aaaah! I know what you mean!
The one thing that I love about my work is that I can put up Bob Marley on Pandora and listen to those reggae beats while manning the reception or smoking. That really does make work alright.
in the mornings before I go to school, I’m usually ready about five minutes early.
So after I’ve got EVERYTHING on (uniform, backpack, shoes, purse, bus money…) I sit on the couch next to my cat (who is almost always there) and put my ear on him and just sit there and listen to him purr until I have to run off to school.
I know it’s a little kid thing to do, but I love making paper chains for various events and hanging them up. Right now I have one for my sixteenth birthday (one link left! it’s tomorrow!), one for the beginning of summer vacation, one for my big dance show, and one for Mother’s day. I like feeling like I have something to look forward to. It helps when life starts seeming really draggy and repetetive.
I put pictures on my iPod of stuff that makes me happy… like sometimes it’s something from cuteoverload.com, sometimes it’s some nice thing a friend sent me, sometimes it’s a picture of a friend… right now I have a bunch of pictures of my best friends brand new baby, a picture of Stitch (from Lilo & Stitch) that a friend sent me, one of each dog, and a few of my dance class friends in these crazy white romantic tutus acting like fools. But I take it with me and just flip through the pictures when I have small amounts of dead time. It makes me feel better.
Rock on, dood! 
I am in fact just about to write a “sample persuasive essay” for a Language Arts workbook on the topic “Teachers Should Play Music During Classwork.” At work. This is my job!
At work, we have “casual Fridays,” which years ago I decided meant “y’all can wear whatever you want, mostly” and I wear sarees. When I skip and wear western stuff, it’s amazing how many people (flatteringly, sweetly) complain!
I admit it – I’m an attention whore… don’t tell anybody
[on preview] Ooh!
That is SO the best idea! Thank you!
For a while, it was my job to collect the trash from the drafting room. After a few days, I decided that draftsmen start their day by scattering paperclips on the floor, just as Sumos scatter salt to purify the ring. Sometime during the day, they had their daily rubber band fight.
When I worked 2nd shift, our first break was at 5:30 pm. We’d go out on the back dock for a smoke. Precisely at 5:40, every evening, a cat would emerge from his house and walk down the street to his turn. He’d stop, look around, and walk down the next street. We came to call our break, “gotta see a man about a cat.”