I am addicted and it is all my daughter’s fault…

I am addicted and it is all my daughter’s fault…

Well that may be a bit of an exaggeration. Well over a year ago my daughter bought a tablet. I was so impressed with the possibilities that a few months later I bought one for myself. I have used it a lot. I check my email on it in the evening, see what is happening on CBC, read books when I am travelling, and on occasion add to this blog using the tablet. On average I use it perhaps no more than 15 to 20 minutes a day. I need to charge it perhaps once a week. It is faster and cheaper in terms of electricity to use the tablet than it is to turn on the big computer for these small tasks. I only had downloaded one game (Tetris) and could go for months without playing it. I was happy with my purchase.  But all that changed at Christmas.

My daughter told me about Angry Birds. It is a silly little game. On the surface it is not much more sophisticated than the first computer games such Space Invaders. Of course the graphics are much superior but there is not much of a plot. There is no real strategy required and in fact relatively little eye hand coordination.  It has no redeeming social value what-so-ever. But like all things addictive it doesn’t have to have any positive uses.  Its sole purpose in life it to seduce one into spending hours and hours trying to get to the next level. And then when you get there, you start all over again trying to kill the damn silly, smiling, smirking, laughing at me green pigs.

Its OK. I am not taking it personally. I know that those insolent beady eyed little cartoon pigs are not really making fun of me. I have noticed however that more and more often I say to myself “I must stop – I just try one more time”, and then proceed to waste another 20 minutes before I tell myself that I have better things to do. The game sneaks into my subconscious sometimes as I imagine how I am going to blow up the structure and destroy them all. I even think about buying a better tablet that is more responsive to my touch so that I would have more control and therefore be able to more efficiently blow up those silly little green frogs.

So I think I am addicted. I am addicted to that wee little shot of adrenaline that burst into my bloodstream when I blast them into nothingness.  I am addicted to that impossibly small bit of satisfaction as I see my points and move on to the next level. I can see myself going down into that dark place from where there is no return. Spending all of my hours holding that 8 inch tablet, developing blisters and then calluses, forsaking my job and my friends just for the remote possibility that I may defeat the little buggers.

My only hope is that when there is spring in the air, the memory of what the sun feels like on my face will draw me outside and free me from this sickness.