I have been seriously short of blogging mo' lately, but this is actually a good thing! It's reflective of just generally spending less time online, after a long spell of obsessive email and facebook checking and otherwise social not-working. Sometimes that happens to me; I'll just get into a mindset that I get antsy if a couple hours go by that I haven't plugged in. It's like I am waiting for something, but since I am not, it never arrives. So I just keep checking. There's something weirdly irrational about it; I keep cycling through my links, thinking the entire time that I'm going to stop right after this, and go do what I ought to be doing.
It's probably just ordinary procrastination, but there's an icky, compulsive feeling to it, which got me thinking about Internet Addiction. Turns out that's a thing! Or might be a thing, defined as "excessive computer use that interferes with daily life." Well, shoot. That could be me. So I took the test. My score was 39, which puts me in the average-user range. Whew! I'm okay then.
Yeah-yeah, I know: the question isn't whether someone else thinks I surf too much; it's whether I think I surf too much, and during those periods of intense usage, I do think so. Fortunately, though, my bouts of compulsive surfing end when real life breaks the cycle; when I have company, say, or I get a new book. Maybe that-right-thar is the difference: it's not pathological as long as "real" activities are still more important.
If I were watching television for those hours instead of surfing, would I be worried about it? Maybe not, but my refrigerator would be just as dirty.
