A Day in The Life of an Addict by Pam Allen Dirty dishes, dirty clothes, dusty house. Your picture is on a milk carton. Sound familiar?

7:30 am-Stumble out of bed and verify that daughter is awake and getting ready for school. Point her towards the bus stop and head back to bed.

11:00 am-Hop out of bed, rested and refreshed and ready to conquer anything. Get dressed, brush teeth, apply cosmetic enhancements and go downstairs.

11:30 am-Step outside to check mailbox and current weather conditions. Junk mail and catalogs, weather is warm and sunny.

noon-Wander into kitchen to get caffeine fix and snack. Notice that kitchen could really use a good cleaning. Kitchen chores delayed by need to “check in” online.

12:30-check email and verify current weather conditions. Junk mail and E-catalogs. Weather is cold and snowy. Realize that weather conditions in Toronto are irrelevant; enter information for correct zip code. Still warm and sunny. Notice that inbox has 300 messages. Decide to organize mail into additional folders and subfolders.

3:00 pm-Inbox is empty; mail is organized according to category, sender, date, and relevancy. Now have new folder called “misc” that contains 240 former inbox messages that defy standard categorization. Visit online forum I frequent. New member today! Boyfriend cheats on her, uses more drugs than the average hospital, and hits her “occasionally”. What should she do? Can not formulate helpful response that doesn’t contain the word “moron”, so I leave plea for assistance unanswered.

4:00 pm-Daughter is home from school and hungry. Prepare nutritious after school snack of Twinkies and hot chocolate, again noticing that kitchen is in serious need of attention.

4:30 pm-Check status of interesting auctions on Ebay. Compare prices for coveted item at 35 online sources. Seems to average $150.00. Enter bid of $9.99 on Ebay. Read help forums on Ebay. Resolve to drive to Montana to pick up my $10.00 item in person because all sellers will take my money and run.

5:00 pm-Hunt for bookmark to interesting site I discovered last week. Notice that bookmarks are in serious need of reorganizing.

7:00 pm-Bookmarks organized into 136 topic-specific folders and subfolders. “Shopping/Stores” folder takes up 1 gigabyte of hard drive space.

7:15 pm-Prepare nourishing meal for family (phone for pizza).

7:30 pm-Spend quality time with adoring family.

8:00 pm-Check status of Ebay auction and read email.

8:15 pm-Help daughter with homework (“your dad’s the math whiz. He’d be better than I am”).

8:30 pm-Husband is sighing loudly. Wants to talk before he goes to bed. Offer to send him a mushy email. Sensing growing hostility, I turn off the computer and talk to husband while I clean the kitchen.

10:00 pm-Everyone is in bed. Finally! Uninterrupted time to myself. Meet best friend at game site and play gin rummy and scrabble.

2:00 am-Write brief humorous article for website. Write helpful article for second website. Write movie review for local newspaper.

3:00 am-Play two games of solitaire. Decide to check on my Sims. Joan is unhappy. Take Joan to Sim Mall to buy clothes and flowers. Joan’s energy level at 0, put Joan in bed.

4:00 am-My energy level at 0. Put self to bed. *sigh* Bemoan busy life, wish for time to relax.

Copyright 2001 Pam Allen

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