The Silver Lining

Wow. I haven't blogged -- I mean really blogged -- in what feels like FOR.EV.ER. You'll have to forgive me if I'm a little bit rusty :)

In case you're wondering {though I doubt you are}, we did end up having to get a new computer. We got a call from the Geek Squad on Saturday letting us know that our poor stupid annoying ridiculously unreliable little laptop had finally given up the ghost for good. Evidently there are limits as to how many times you can perform surgery on a motherboard and be successful.

That was the bad news.

The good news was that WE GOT A NEW COMPUTER!! And it was {almost} free! We got store credit to purchase a new laptop -- and we actually got a little bit of an upgrade! And since I know you're wondering -- no, we did not get a Mac.

I know, I know! Lecture if you will, but we simply don't have 500 extra smackeroos laying around the house to put towards a computer that we shouldn't have had to buy anyway. However, we DID totally give HP the cold shoulder {my mama didn't raise no dummy} and went with a Sony instead.

If it breaks down in a year and a half, feel free to say I told you so.

Anyway, I do have to say that being forced to take an "Internet fast" for a couple of weeks wasn't all bad. In fact, in a lot of ways it was really really good for me.

I had a lot of time to reflect on ways that technology -- particularly the Internet and even more specifically blogging -- have affected me, and I came to the conclusion that {brace yourselves profound thought here} there's a little bit of good and a little bit of bad. I KNOW. Deep ;)

For example, through the Internet I can be...

• Inspired -- ladies like Sarah give me fresh ideas on decorating; sites like One Pretty Thing get my creative juices flowing and give me projects I can steal borrow and make my own; Crystal is a wellspring of information both saving and making money from home
  
  
• Encouraged -- I love reading other "mommy bloggers" -- ladies who are in the trenches with me, who get what I'm going through on a day to day basis. Or maybe it's spiritual encouragement from gals like Rachel, or Sarah, or Andrea.
  
  
• Humored -- {ok so I can't think of a better word -- give me a break, it's been 2 weeks :)} Big Mama, Boo Mama, and Mama Belle {hmmm...sensing a trend with the word "Mama" here} provide a little comic relief in my day.

And there are so many other good things -- keeping up with old friends and making new ones. Those are all really good things.

But there are also a whole host of bad things that can come along with it:

• Jealousy and discontentment {"Her house is beautiful", "They have so much more money than we do", "She's so pretty", "I love her blog design", "I wish I could be that crafty" "Her pictures don't look like they were taken by a two year old" etc, etc etc}
  
  
• Distraction {"I just need to do this one more thing" Click. Click. Click. "Wait, where did that hour just go?"}
  
  
• Laziness
  
  
• Pride

Just like any hobby, blogging/Facebook/surfing the Internet needs to have it's proper place in my list of priorities -- and if I'm being honest with myself, I think in the past couple of months I had let it slip up to occupy the top spot. Maybe God was trying to teach me a lesson -- I mean, frying a few motherboards is hardly beyond His capabilities ;)

At any rate, I'm thankful to have a computer back for all those good reasons I listed above. And if I sense myself losing the battle with some of those bad things? I'll step away again.

Now, off to try to finish playing catch up with all my favorite blogs!

P.S. If you want a really good read on going without your computer for a week click here. I could have pretty much copied and pasted her thoughts -- I especially like her analogy of the slot machine -- go read it and I think you'll agree.

Toodles!