It seems to happen every year. The semester is crawling by. Monotony and ennui fill each day, and there isn’t enough coffee in the world to keep your eyes open. All of a sudden you look at the calendar and you realize “holy s%$#@ there are only 3 weeks left in the semester!!”. Well, the first and most valuable tip we can give is, “Don’t Panic!”

1) Don’t Panic: The easiest and most obvious tip, but in practice it never really works. The honest truth is that you will get to the end of the semester. It’s coming and their is nothing you can do about it. You might feel as though you will never finish what you have to get finished, but just think back to every other semester. You will soon realize that everything will get done, maybe not exactly the way you wanted but it will get done. The reward for all of your hard work is summer!

2) Make a schedule and stick to it: Again another obvious tip, but the truth is that stress can be dramatically reduced with proper time management. Set out key parts of your day, where you feel that you can optimize your time most efficiently. You know the times of day when you work the best, so plan accordingly. If you know that you procrastinate less late at night, make sure you get proper rest during the day. If you have to go to work, utilize any break time you might have, ask for different hours, or take off from work completely. We understand that taking off from work might sound unrealistic to some of you but if you are working strictly to have pocket money, nothing is more important than your education, so again it comes to down to prioritizing your time. For anyone who works because they absolutely need to, the simple truth is spacing out your work load. If you know you’re going to have to work then make sure you get a jump start on your school work so you don’t end stuck between a rock and a hard place.

3) Avoid Procrastination Hot Spots: You know exactly where to go if you don’t want to get work done. The lounges where everyone talks and plays on their computers, the computer lab where everyone plays online games, and the library during peak hours. If you go to these places expecting to get work done, then you are just lying to yourself. Finals time does not mean punishment or exile. It means that there are specific places for work and play, and in college those places are often confused or mixed together. The trick is finding places that you know are quiet and where nothing  but work gets done. This sometimes mean getting out of your dorm room or bedroom. Why? Well, the typical American dorm room or bedroom usually features a game console of some type. When faced with a blank word document, a game that has gone unplayed for months can all of a sudden become an insatiable need. So unless you can control yourself, find a neutral spot to get work done. One final tip for extreme procrastinators: have a friend you trust parental block procrastination websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and the like. We know you have smartphones, but do the smart thing and stow it somewhere far away. After staring at a blank word document on a big computer screen, those sites become irresistible to look at.

4) Go Outside!: This is an important tip. Most college students think that exile is the proper way to deal with finals. Becoming a recluse is not the solution to getting all your work done. One of the worst ironies of finals is that the most beautiful time of year are the three weeks before finals. The temperature and weather are just simply magnificent from the end of April to the end of May. Don’t let this get you depressed because you feel you have to stay inside and work. If you’re going to take a break, don’t do it by playing video games, or going on Youtube and Facebook. Go outside and take a break. If you have to study or read seemingly endless papers and books, do it outside under a tree, on a bench, or in the outfield of the baseball practice field. An important part of remaining sane during finals time is to get out. Getting ready to go out is an important routine to keep. If you look good than you will feel good. So if you force yourself to go outside than you will have to get ready to go out. Most college student ignore this anyway but trust us. Get ready for the day and go outside, you will feel so much better.

5) Ask for help: There is no shame in asking people for help. Most stress during finals comes from not having enough knowledge to understand the course material fully. Form study groups and actually work in the study groups. Make study groups with your friends only if you know work will get done. If you have rambunctious friends who don’t care about school work as much you, than avoid them at all costs. A second set of eyes to look at your papers is always important. Have your friends read your papers for you or we strongly recommend seeking professional help from your school’s writing center or from us. We can edit your papers and get them back to you within 24 hours. It is impossible to get through  the last weeks of the semester alone. Seek advice from others about what they do to get through this time of year. College is ultimately based on your singular achievements but those achievements are impossible to obtain without the help and advice from others. If you take anything away from this article, know that Ringo wasn’t wrong when he said “I get by with a little help from my friends”. 

6) Get some sleep: This is the hardest and most important tip for surviving the end of the year. Sleep during the last three weeks of the year might sound like something from your past, but it really is important. When your mind is rested, you retain information better, you work more efficiently, and finally, you just feel better. A common and unfortunate misconception about college is that sleep deprivation is part of the deal. Now I would be lying when I say sleep deprivation is avoidable, especially during finals time, but the problem is most college students make it a regular occurrence. If you want to make sure you are truly prepared and ready for the end of the year, getting enough sleep is one of the best tips we can give. If you want to make sure you get enough sleep, just make sure you do steps 1-5 and you will get enough sleep to ace all of your finals.

7) Simple tips that will make your life easier: Avoid junk food. Eating healthy or eating the right food will ensure that you have enough energy to get through the day.

-Keep you work area clean. If you’re surrounded by chaos your work style will become chaotic.

-You are the most important person during finals time. You are allowed to be selfish with your time and knowledge. Don’t let anyone get you down or slow you down. Kick off dead weight and avoid people who are looking for people to sink with as they will take you down with them.

-Finally, never question yourself or your answers. If you did the work and you studied confidently, then you should never question yourself. Ignore the people in the room five minutes before the test discussing the wrong answers. Chances are they tried to cram 10 minutes before the test.

From all of us here at The Editor Guys, good luck and just remember summer is just around the corner. And finally, don’t panic.

You’re in the home stretch. Finals move ever closer as the days melt away. This isn’t high school anymore where multiple choice exams and scantrons ruled the day. You’ve got papers. We know, we were there.

 It probably seems like your professors conspire to make the weeks leading into finals the most intense weeks of the semester. Everything is due at the same time, and oftentimes it’s hard to properly allot time where it’s needed. You might spend too much time on one paper when it’s really the other that needed your powers of concentration, and when it gets down to the wire, some typos might slip through.

We want to help you get through these trying times. Don’t let some missing commas, split infinitives, and misplaced apostrophes trip you up during the final lap. Send your papers to the Editor Guys, and we’ll make sure your language flows smoothly.

From all of us here at The Editor Guys, be careful this weekend. If you can stay home, cuddle up with a warm libation and a good book, do so.

Another tip, take advantage of what will most likely be a long weekend for many of you, and get a head start on some of your upcoming papers and writing assignments. Once you’re done, submit it to us and we will give it a polish, so that your paper is done and ready to hand in way ahead of time. Trust us, everyone will be jealous when you’re done while they are stressing the night before the paper is due. When that happens, you can  catch up on some much needed sleep.

Commas have been tragically sidelined in today’s society in favor of long unbroken strands of text that do not allow the reader to breathe because there are not any pauses until the writer puts in a comma or a period.

And breathe.

Don’t cause textual asphyxiation. Use a comma. Save a person’s life.

Winter break is sadly past tense, and the semester is slowly waking up. Papers are not yet a reality, but they will be soon. We know. We were there, too.

We are the Editor Guys, and we are here to help you fine-tune your writing so that your grade doesn’t get docked for punctuation, grammar, and the like. Consider us quality control at an affordable price.

You might not even be in academia, but if you have some writing, we’ll take a look at it. Résumés. Cover letters. Resignation letters. Love letters. Blog posts. Essentially, if it has words, we can help.

Everyone makes mistakes, but when you have to meet a deadline, or are faced with a seemingly endless amount of papers, sometimes important things like grammar get overlooked.

Click on the “Editing Center” above and submit it to us for review. We can’t guarantee that we will get back to you within an hour but we can guarantee that you will have your submission back to you fully edited within 24 hours.

Remember: you handle the content, we handle the style. We’re the Editor Guys. Let us guide you into a grammatically correct future.

We’ll be up and running for the Spring 2013 semester. Their wont be anything to worry  about. We’ll fix your there/their/they’re, commas, apostrophes, and everything in between parentheses.

That second sentence is a gag!

Please excuse our appearance. We will be up and running very soon. Thank you for your patience.