where art collides

3rd law part 6

I’m staring at a towering in-tray. Most of the stuff in there can probably be thrown away or recycled. The point is I just don’t know because the higher the pile gets the less likely I am to tackle the job. It has to be said that usually when I do take on the task, which isn’t that often hence the height of the pile, I find a letter that I should have opened 2 months ago, or one that I had been waiting for but wondered why it hadn’t arrived yet.

It’s almost amazing that we still get physical mail. At work it will mostly be junk that gets binned immediately (or when I get round to it 🙂  ). Most people have learned to communicate by email, or instant message or twitter.

As the kids get older the snail mail system does lead to some amusing problems. Tom and I get letters addressed to T Davies. It irritates the heck out of him that I sometimes open his mail by accident. How was I to know? There hasn’t been anything uber-embarrassing yet. Just bank account type stuff.

Kids need to have their privacy though and at first it is a difficult one to get your brain round because “you have always controlled everything” when it comes to your kids. The hardest one was when he left home to go to university.

The old university thing is an interesting one. I did bugger all work when I went to uni. Had a great time. “Didn’t hurt me.” The problem comes when you have told your own kids that that is how you conducted yourself. Now I have nothing to contribute to the debate. As long as you pass and don’t get kicked out is all I can say.

You may have noticed a certain lack of flow in this writing this morning. It’s not because it’s morning. It’s because I keep jumping back and fore from twitter to Word. I keep doing it but not because I have an active twitter conversation on the go. Hardly anyone I know is awake. It’s because I’m addicted.

I freely admit this. It’s part of my rehab. It’s not really. That just came out but there could be a germ of an idea there. “The Philosopher On Tap rehab clinic for internet addicts”, specialising in healthy country walks without your phone. We could have individual lockers for people to keep their laptop battery and power supply so that internet access was denied.

For it to work people would have to admit that they have a problem in the first place which could be an issue. I’m not sure that “internet addiction” is a clinically recognised ailment yet. It should be though and someone has to invent or discover it for the first time. A bit like the “Third Law”.

There you go. I’ve just discovered something else. I won’t google it just in case someone else has already done so and not told me. That would be so disappointing. Can you detect an element of denial creeping in here? It’s a sure sign of addiction though I feel I am getting my addictions mixed up. How can one possibly have an addiction to wanting to have invented things?

I bet Leonardo Da Vinci didn’t have the same problem. Not that I am comparing myself with Leonardo you understand. He was the only inventor I could think of at such short notice. Barnes Wallis also springs to mind, the inventor of the bouncing bomb.  But I thought of Leonardo first and he probably invented more stuff than BW, not that I’m sure of my facts on this one.

Anyone who feels they have an addiction to the internet should leave a comment on this post. All comments will be treated in total confidence – our therapists are fully trained. Most of them have already been through the treatment themselves.

It can be quite tough at first so we do break you in gently. It typically starts by getting you to turn your phone to silent. That way you still have the comfort factor of the phone in your pocket but are already beginning the process of being weaned off. With the most difficult of cases we get them to gradually reduce the volume of their ring tone, or change the ring tone to something less intrusive.

I used to have “phone call for Trefor Davies, phone call for Trefor Davies” as my ring tone. My daughter recorded it. That would have been a good start for our treatment programme because I could never hear it – especially if I was in a pub and engrossed in conversation. I had to change it in the end because I kept missing phone calls and we must remember that the purpose of this treatment is not actually to stop you talking to people but to stop you using the phone to access the internet.

Talking is in fact encouraged under the POT Clinic rehab programme. POT Clinic makes it sound like something different. Mixed messages there. I might have to re-evaluate the name but it will do for now.

Branding is ever so important don’t you think:) . Most of my clothes have got one brand or another on them. It isn’t what you are thinking though. They are mostly ones I have been given for free through work – none of the names on the t-shirts are ones you would recognise. I’m not a poser, just a cheapskate.

Talking about t-shirts I am just making another pot of tea. I found 4 teabags in the tea pot. Obviously not cleaned out in between “rounds”. I use 3 teabags first thing in the morning but only two during the day. Need that little bit more of a kick first thing obviously. It isn’t a huge teapot.

3rd Law Part 8