Oh, Katherine, you should start painting again and sell your stuff on ebay !!!!!!!
I guess for some reason I've been finding it more entertaining and productive to spend my time exchanging insults with people online.
I'm reading this great book
Rapt, by Winifred Gallagher (wisely recommended, for the record, by our own Front-Ranger!). One of the many excellent points she makes is that people tend to be much happier when they're doing activities that are creative, absorbing, engaging, etc. For example, playing the piano, woodworking, writing, gardening, gourmet cooking, etc. (different things for different people, obviously).
However, those activities require a certain degree of concentration, preparation and energy. People come home from work and they don't want to go to the bother. Instead, they turn on the TV (or computer). So they wind up spending 80 percent of their time doing something that, in the end, they don't find as rewarding. And that ends up being their life.
Disclaimer: Coming here, to me, is about socializing with friends and often requires thinking -- about one's opinions, about how to express one's thoughts, about learning new things, etc. -- so it's not in exactly the same category as watching mindless TV. I have to wonder, though, if when I come here and wind up engaging in bitchfests if I'm making the best use of my time.
