Living Hand to Mouse

Hello. My name is Thom and I’m addicted to my computer and The Internet. ‘Hi Thom.’ This will surely become a nightly exchange at some future 12-step program for techno junkies. I may start a program myself in our living room. I’ve got to quit. I started documenting and analyzing my time on the computer everyday and it’s scary. I’m on it all day doing one thing or another. It keeps me from living, it keeps me from working and it keeps me focused on things that are very unnecessary. I check my e-mail first thing every morning. Then I go to my online banking site. Then I check out Facebook and then I go to my own web site. I surf to the web sites of both of my jobs and then I check my e-mail again. I have six e-mail accounts, which is absurd. They all have different reasons for existing although I shall not share that information with you for obvious reasons. (I used to check my investments but I no longer have investments because I am a songwriter and we don’t make money any more – we only withdraw the money from our IRA’s that was saved during the years when we did make money. Don’t get me started.) I have a handful of web sites that I go to everyday – bloggers I like, a few religious writers I enjoy, the Bible on-line, a couple music sites and a few organizations with which I am bonded. I am addicted. I have no idea what my life was like prior to The Internet. I’ll bet it was pleasant, relaxed, full of free time and thought provoking. After a morning on my computer I want to rip off my clothes and run naked in the streets. I feel empty-headed, stupid, small minded, unhealthy and wired. But then I return and start all over again: Has anyone written me back? What is so-and-so’s latest update? Is the world really going to end in 2012 according to the Inca calendar? Has KVD sent out his Curmudgeon in the Wry? What’s going on in Washington? It’s awful. I want to quit but I can’t. Guess I’ll have a drink.