January 31, 2012

• Divided Minds

  Dearest Internets,

  I must apologize for my behavior these past few days. I've been in a sort of a slump, where the Internets seem endlessly fascinating, and ambition is in short supply. I have let the queue of things-to-be-done pile up, and rather than dealing with it, I pushed it to the back of my mind for one more website, five more minutes, another hour, and another few days.

  The trouble with resolutions of abstention from certain websites or Terraria or the ilk is that they are not things I decide once. They are things I must decide over and over again, twenty times each day, whenever the urge arises. Even if I have only a 1/20 chance of making the wrong decision each time, that sends my success rate over a day plummeting to 1/e, or 0.368. Especially at night, it becomes easier and easier to make the wrong decisions, and my hours from midnight to sunrise are often spent in the glow of a Terrarian dawn.

  I had hoped to get through this semester without ever missing a single class (not counting actual reasons), and I broke that not one month into school.

  For whatever reason, even though I know what I ought to do and what my past and future selves would want me to do, at the present moment, I fail to do it. For days, my present moments failed to do much of anything. I wish I could point to one thing and say, that is the cause; that is what I need to change. The reality is I don't actually know what causes it and why these slumps come up sometimes. But sometimes, I look around and am horrified to find that this is where things have ended up.

  I am sad that this happened and unhappy with myself. I am also grateful that not so much damage has been done. My schoolwork is recoverable; I'll be caught up again.

  I'll be spending the next few days pulling things from the queue and executing them. I apologize if I've missed your email or failed to return your call. Thank you for your patience with me. If all goes well, I should be ready for the first post of Miscarriage of Justice Week on Friday. Things never go entirely according to plan, so I'll aim for Monday as the starting day.

  Peace and happiness,
  wobster109

  • 6:51 pm
  • 1 Comment