Just skimming the surface
Have you ever felt that the volume of news regarding subjects of interest has grown past what you can effectively digest? This being an election year would have normally been political overload for me. Keeping up with a war and a tanked economy and my government further unraveling daily has cut into the time usually reserved for finding out what's new in the Mac world, pleasure reading, and my photo related hobbies. If I had more clear-brain time during the day and didn't stop for a nap to recharge, I'd probably burn myself out all over again. So, I find myself skimming information more and digesting less (not that I can remember it all, but I like to go through the exercise). I don't know what to cut back on and grow more resentful of the times I can only single-task. For sure, I can't cut back on keeping up with my family or my cats, or sleep less. Additional stimulants do help but I think I'm approaching the practical limit of Diet Coke, expresso, and Ritalin. I will not admit to middle age being part of the equation. Middle age? Who coined that phrase as a euphemism for 50+ year olds? I'm supposedly in middle age, but am certain that I don't want to live to be 112 years old. Technology is a big help in culling information: I use Google's newsreader to aggregate feeds that I'm interested in and that cuts reading down to under 200 articles a day. During the process, hypertext allows me to jump out from each article and head down rabbit trails until I've forgotten what subject I started on. Needless to say, unless I start over on an article and re-read it, the point of article eludes me. Did you know that a chap named Ted Nelson coined the phrase "hypertext"? He also said, "A user interface should be so simple that a beginner in an emergency can understand it within ten seconds." As is usually the case, Mr. Nelson's original concept lost much of it's functionality during application. If anyone has a suggestion (non-Luddite) to help me streamline things, or a method to grow callous to the available news, I'd appreciate it.