Me and my computer

I admit, in recent years I am on my computer a lot. When you shoot a lot of digital photos and need to process them before you can print them, that can take a lot of screen time. Then there's the ever-widening circle of long distance friends you keep up with over e-mail, IM and Facebook. And, well, I like to blog. And I like to read blogs. Then there's the vast amounts of free online newspapers and magazines when I want to find out about current events. And I don't know how you could operate a budget and keep it updated without some kind of software program.

Now that I'm living in Europe, I feel like my computer is actually growing out of my hand. Previously, I used my computer for a lot of things. These days I pretty much need it for everything.

I didn't think much about it until a friend came to visit and, after we'd return from several days of traveling, she'd see me jump on my computer at night. She said: "I've noticed that you are on your computer a LOT."

For someone who has not lived outside the U.S., an explanation was in order.

1. When you leave all your cookbooks in a box in someone's basement, your computer becomes your cookbook. Even if you're cooking convenience foods where you just take it out of the freezer and pop it in the oven or dump it in boiling water, you need Google Translate in order to read the German cooking instructions.

2. When you don't have English-language TV options, you have to watch all your shows and news on your computer.

3. When you don't have an international phone calling plan, you call your friends and family on your computer, or email them when you want to talk.

4. When you take pictures of your travels and want to share them, you have to process them on your computer, back them up on CD and post them to a website so your family can see them. No more whipping out a scrapbook.

5. When you want to pay your American bills, you have to go to the bank Web site and send electronic checks to pay your bills, rather than writing out paper checks, stuffing them in an envelope and popping them in your mailbox.

6. If you want to read an English book, you have to download it from an e-book store and read it on your computer.

7. When you ordinarily would run to Borders to spend a few hours reading manga, now you have to read free scanlations on manga websites.

8. Having left all your CDs back home, and when you don't have a stereo in your borrowed apartment, you listen to music on iTunes or download songs to your computer to put on your iPod.

9. When you have a remote job that involves operating a Web site 7 hours ahead of most of your coworkers, you frequently check your email and make additions to the site in the evening before going to bed, not mention doing it all day at work.

10. When you don't have local TV stations and you want to know what the weather is going to be that day, you have to jump online first thing in the morning so you'll know what to wear.

11. When you're living in an unfamiliar place and want to go somewhere new, you have to go online to map out a driving route or look up train schedules.


So, dear friends, that's why it might seem like I have a computer growing out of my hand. Anything I would have done in the States in other ways, I have to do it here on a computer.