Into the night

There are usually five or six emails in my inbox at work that I am actively ignoring at any one time. The worst of the present bunch dates back to April. It isn't even a particularly horrible email. It's from an old colleague who'd like to meet up for a drink. I like this old colleague, the prospect of drinks with her is not unpleasant, but I cannot bring myself to reply.
I'm not one to keep to-do lists, but if I were, you can bet it would follow this same pattern, with my blog somewhere up there in the bunch of top (or bottom) tasks ripe for ignoring.

There's clearly something wrong with me.

Psychologists call it procrastination, defined as a "counterproductive" deferment of actions to a later time. It's supposed to be "a mechanism for coping with the anxiety associated with starting or completing any task or decision", which is ironic considering the effects of procrastinating can include "stress, a sense of guilt and crisis, severe loss of personal productivity" and "social disapproval".

Ironically, by turning to Wikipedia for a diagnosis of my condition, I managed to put off writing this blog for a whole other day.

What happened is I got sucked into World of Warcraft, the cyber equivalent of a crack den, and have spent the last three years of my life spiralling into sleep-deprived oblivion. I have managed to keep my head above water at work, and have done enough to keep my relationship together, but that's about it. My friends, my career, even my self-esteem, have suffered.

My work is so pressured right now that I'm not even getting home in time to raid. And I clearly haven't been finding the time to stay on top of this blog. So it keeps getting pushed to the bottom of my virtual list, where it lurks and seethes and gangs up with emails from long-suffering ex-colleagues to make me feel guilty and ashamed.

It's cathartic just to even put that down in writing. My neglected blog has been bullying me.

I'd love to say right now, having reached my epiphany, that I will no longer procrastinate. I will complete all tasks that come to me in a timely and professional manner. But it's not going to happen. I am both incredibly busy and incredibly lazy. Something has got to give.

So for now, it's got to be this blog.

I think it's safe to say that if I am not blogging about the most monumental patch to ever hit this game a week before it's due to land, I'm never going to. And that's a huge shame because this is exactly the kind of thing I set out to write about, and the kind of thing I love doing, time willing.

I had a good run, I think. This blog, and all of you who read and contributed to it, made me a better player. And I think I got a lot more out of my subscription by investing time here, in the WoW community, with you. Thank you very much for sticking with me this long.

I'll not be quitting WoW any time soon, and I'm not going to rule out another blog at some point in the future, but until I can sort out my priorities and learn to balance my time a little better, it's time to let the shadow fall on Misery. Happy face melting :)