Are You Ready for the Summer?
With each passing year, I get itchier and itchier about the prospect for a Summer vacation, even as that possibility draws further and further away. Yesenia's work schedule being what it is, as well as her need to save vacation time to visit her family and friends in Puerto Rico, has made our great get-in-the-car-and-go-for-a-week drives a thing of the past, and I'll admit I lament their loss. But I also can take advantage of the (somewhat compromised, true) freedom I have in working at home by taking a number of mini-drives by myself to points wherever.
In the Summer, 'points wherever' is here defined as 'New England.' So I'm taking a few days later this week to drive up to Maine to stay at my friend Putnam's new home, a genuine log cabin. I'm reasonably sure that there's no plumbing or electricity, so the staying there will be a small adventure in and of itself. I'll also be backing him on a few songs at one of his shows, which will be nice - I particularly enjoy playing live when I don't have to worry so much about carrying the show.
I'm still in the process of debating whether or not I'll be bringing the laptop with me, so the mini-trip may result in the blacking out of the Rambler for a few days. It would be useful to bring it, since I'd like to do a few changes to Putnam's site and I always find it hard to do any web work of that nature unless the person who it's for is in the room with me. But I also know myself well enough to know that I get anxious having to carry the damn thing around with me everywhere I go. In Puerto Rico, it was a genuine struggle to bring myself to leave it in the room, but I did and (of course) nothing happened to it.
Which proves nothing!
The main reason I want to leave it behind for a few days is just to, you know, leave it behind for a few days. I'd always thought of myself as a relatively addiction-free guy, but I'll admit that my relationship to the internet - and email in particular - verges dangerously close to obsession. It's more a symptom of a problem than a problem itself - really, it's because I have a terrible work ethic and anything I can do to fill up the time in a meaningless way is fine with me.
Not being a gamer, and no longer having cable television, means that the options for this kind of low-effort, passive entertainment have now been limited to the internet. Which, sadly, is pretty limited when you get down to it. I'm not sure when it happened, but a depressing fact about the internet is that the whole of human endeavor is on here, and it's actually small, lame and kind of dull.
Or maybe that's just me?
D.
In the Summer, 'points wherever' is here defined as 'New England.' So I'm taking a few days later this week to drive up to Maine to stay at my friend Putnam's new home, a genuine log cabin. I'm reasonably sure that there's no plumbing or electricity, so the staying there will be a small adventure in and of itself. I'll also be backing him on a few songs at one of his shows, which will be nice - I particularly enjoy playing live when I don't have to worry so much about carrying the show.
I'm still in the process of debating whether or not I'll be bringing the laptop with me, so the mini-trip may result in the blacking out of the Rambler for a few days. It would be useful to bring it, since I'd like to do a few changes to Putnam's site and I always find it hard to do any web work of that nature unless the person who it's for is in the room with me. But I also know myself well enough to know that I get anxious having to carry the damn thing around with me everywhere I go. In Puerto Rico, it was a genuine struggle to bring myself to leave it in the room, but I did and (of course) nothing happened to it.
Which proves nothing!
The main reason I want to leave it behind for a few days is just to, you know, leave it behind for a few days. I'd always thought of myself as a relatively addiction-free guy, but I'll admit that my relationship to the internet - and email in particular - verges dangerously close to obsession. It's more a symptom of a problem than a problem itself - really, it's because I have a terrible work ethic and anything I can do to fill up the time in a meaningless way is fine with me.
Not being a gamer, and no longer having cable television, means that the options for this kind of low-effort, passive entertainment have now been limited to the internet. Which, sadly, is pretty limited when you get down to it. I'm not sure when it happened, but a depressing fact about the internet is that the whole of human endeavor is on here, and it's actually small, lame and kind of dull.
Or maybe that's just me?
D.
posted by Dave Kopperman | 10:16 PM
5 Comments:
Why no cable tv?
Originally it was a budget thing - our cable bill was $70+ a month, and especially after "Six Feet Under" ended and "Carnivale" got the axe, I just couldn't work out why we were paying that much.
I can't honestly say as I've really missed it, but it's no doubt time to get it back. Most likely, we'll go with the Verizon service, since they also handle our internet and phone - and I really hated Cablevision service.
D.
70 bucks? I pay 200 bucks..
Time Warner is worse than cablevision..
Right, but I suspect that you may get more use from it than I did. We were literally paying $70 a month for nothing. All I ended up missing was Mythbusters and Stewart, although I did feel a tinge of regret when Flight of the Conchords came on - but we ended up just going over to Bubba & Fi's (and occasionally Karl's) to watch it, so that worked out fine.
I don't know how people put up with Time Warner Cable. They seem like the worst kind of fucking monopoly.
D.
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