brain crash

a long time ago when i lived in san francisco a colleague told me his personal theory that our devices -- computers, cell phones, pdas, etc. -- have become offloaded parts of our brains. certain functions previously accomplished by the brain such as remembering phone numbers, organizing schedules, keeping track of birthdays were now being done by the parts of our brain that consisted of zeroes and ones.

therefore, he posited, when one of these devices crashes we feel as if a part of our brain has malfunctioned. it is more than a mere inconvenience, worse than our car breaking down or our refrigerator dying. it is as if a part of ourselves has crashed as well.

it is in this state of crash -- partial crash, really -- that i have been existing in the last few weeks. my two and a half year old laptop has suffered a mysterious affliction, one that has had me up nights, waiting by the hospital bed, saying encouraging words, trying to nurse it back to life with the help of experts. this effort has been compounded in the difficultly that i am operating on limited brain power. i have crashed as well. you may have noticed: i am less informed on news and celebrity gossip. blogging has been nonexistent. emailing is sporadic. my sunny disposition has also been affected.

currently we -- my computer and i -- are back up and running on a provisional level, but things are still touch and go. in lieu of flowers, please send your good thoughts and any brand new laptops you happen to have lying around.