Technical Difficulties

When I got my new laptop The Spouse also got me a little, tiny, adorable wireless mouse. My laptop has a pretty decent touch pad but no matter how many generations of these things are developed, I still find them pretty hard to control. For example, I was in my "Favorites" this morning, trying to hit "Ask Jeeves" but the mouse kept drifting up to "Gilmore girls", which was irritating because it took three attempt to get what I wanted. Maybe it isn't touch pad technology, maybe it's me, but I am much faster (hence productive) using an external mouse.

But last night my mouse froze up and it won't unfreeze. The good news, of course, is that I can still operate my laptop using the touch pad. The bad news is that this is going to put a serious crimp in my game-playing.

I realize that this is a shocking admission but I do enjoy the occasional computer game. It might be a quick round of Tetris or Spider Solitaire, it might be something more involved like "Age of Empires" or "The Sims". Don't misunderstand; I do not spend all day, every day engaged in these pursuits. Au contraire, mon ami. I usually save "Age of Empires" for the weekend when we're just hanging. During the week I really am far too busy for a scenario game that could take up to 4 hours to finish. But I will play other sorts of games for a quick break or yes, sometimes, use them as a form of procrastination. A "quick" computer card game is a very effective strategy to avoid, say, balancing the checkbook.

But if I have to use the touch pad I won't be playing. The touch pad sucks all the fun out of the simplest game. I did not create this moratorium but I will embrace it and may even, at some point, reflect upon it. Not because I think there is anything wrong with playing games nor that I play too much to be effective. I know that is not the case. But let's face it. If I think about people I admire, people doing good work in the world, something tells me that none of them spend a lot of time playing computer games. Oprah? Jim Wallis? Diane Keaton? Bono? Anne Lamott? Nelson Mandela? I'm trying to picture any of them in front of a blue screen, playing just "one more game" of Free Cell and I'm just not seeing it.

I suspect I'll be particularly productive today, even if only because I stopped to think about some of my heroes and allowed myself to be inspired by them. I do hope we can get my mouse working again, but maybe it's ok if it takes a few days.