Turning off the tubes

Thursday, February 8, 2007

I had thoughts of a Jewish essay or barely started stories. Neither of them tasted appetizing. I spent a long time drawing today’s doodle. You won’t see it for a while, of course. I have twenty-one doodles in reserve, each wait eagerly for their chance to appear on the front page. (I haven’t produced more than one a day in a while, though. I might have peaked.) I sketched today’s doodle while drinking my coffee early in the afternoon. I was a bit disappointed when I translated the sketch to the computer.

In Chuck’s post today he spoke about his ultra-efficient work mode. He remarked that one way he achieved this mode was by turning off non-work internet use during work hours. I’ve hinted that this is a problem for me as well. Like Chuck, I also previously attempted to give up casual browsing during the workday. I failed on this initial attempt. Today, inspired by Chuck, I made another go of it. It’s amazing how much more efficient I am when I’m not tempted to ride the information tubes.

For me, browsing the internet creates a feedback loop. The more I browse, the more I want to browse, even when there’s nothing much new going on. With millions of content “creators,” it’s still difficult to find interesting new content at all times during the day. But it’s more than the lack of content. It’s the feeling I get when I’m endlessly browsing, hoping for this new content. Instead of creating or doing something, I’m waiting for others to create or do something to entertain me. This feeds into my natural lazy state. It’s only when I step outside this state and force myself to get going that I start accomplishing things.

With my one day of recovery, I managed to slog through my mails and catch up at work. Tomorrow I’m hoping to get through my task list, leaving me with a relaxing weekend. I can’t believe it’s the weekend already. After our whirlwind trip (I don’t know why my trips are always “whirlwinds.” I really need to come up with a new adjective), there’s not much left of the week.

Yes I know this is filler. I need to get on with it and back to it. Where “it,” in this case, is writing of some sort. I’m thinking it’s probably the horned scary sort. I’ll have to look into it. For now, I’ll content myself with worthless words, and escape downstairs to a movie. We finished the anime “Samurai Champloo” and are now at the mercy of our unorganized Netflix queue. I find myself adding movies when I read or hear about them. When those movies pop up at the front of the queue months later, I sometimes forget why I added them and regret the choice. No matter, I need only an hour or so of movie before sleep.

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