The rest of that quotation:  “…are greatly exaggerated,” often attributed to Mark Twain, may or may not be somewhat true of me.  I’m not dead, but who knows how near I may be, and thus, how “greatly” the rumors may be exaggerated.  What Twain actually wrote in 1897 was, “The report of my death is an exaggeration.”  I can state with certainty that any obituary for me would at this time be premature.

Sarah phoned twice, apparently concerned over my long absence from Xanga and Facebook.  She phoned my old number, the one that is now always connected to the interwebs, instead of the new one that comes to the phone I wear all day.  (btw, Sarah, that number is sequentially just one beyond the old one, a “5″ instead of a “4″)   Yesterday, my son neglected to tell me about the message on CallWave, and I only learned of the call today because we were talking when it came in and he said, “Sydney’s calling again.”  I tried to return her call, and got a busy signal.  **sigh**

I have developed an aversion to media such as radio and internet.  Years ago, I developed such an aversion to TV, and that one seems to be permanent.  Maybe this new one is temporary.  I don’t know yet.  Certainly, it is understandable and explicable.  I shall try to explain.  The easiest way is to draw an analogy to drugs.

In my teens, doctors began prescribing tranquilizers and barbiturates for me (downers).  I was already dependent on them (addicted), by the time I reached drinking age and started using alcohol.  I used the downers to achieve oblivion.  That pattern continued into my twenties, when I gained access to illicit amphetamines and psychedelics.  How can I best express this…?  Oblivion lost its appeal.  Faster, higher, better drugs took over, and I developed an aversion to downers that exists to this day.

For as long as I can remember, I have been an information addict, a news junkie.  Sources used to be books, newspapers, radio and TV.  Around the turn of the millennium, when we got onto the electrical grid after 15 years off it, the web supplanted them to some extent.  Concurrently with all that, I have been addicted to puzzles and games. 

Solitaire and jigsaw puzzles occupied much of my time while ill or in prison.  Pinball machines and pool tables were always the best things about working or hanging out in drugstores and bars.  In the mid-1970s, I got a simple first-generation Fairchild video game system, with games such as Pong and Cat and Mouse, and quickly became addicted to the point of carpal tunnel syndrome.  At the turn of the aforementioned millennium, my son and his friend Sephiroth got me hooked on later-generation games such as Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy.

To zoom forward to now — The aforementioned son, Doug, had an online fanfic writing tournament last month.  To placate and pacify me in the absence of my daily Facebook fix, he went through his game collection and found one he knew I could play (the finger work of many shooters, etc., are beyond these old hands of mine) and that he thought I would like. 

By the time the tournament ended, I was strung out on Civilization Revolution to the extent that I’d developed an aversion to radio (which had usually played all day in the background as I read, surfed, worked and played on the web) and also to the computer in general.  I hadn’t begun to tire of that game when Final Fantasy XIII came in the mail, having been ordered pre-publication.  Maybe when I beat the final boss, or maybe even before then — Who knows? — I might be back online more.  As my addiction situation stands currently, I’m not even following the Iditarod.  **wow!**