Instant gratification.

One of the problems with the Internet is that it's instant. The second after I press in Princeton, my friend in Cambridge (England, not MA) can read what I've written. Conversely, I can do the same the second after he presses . This means that if at 5:01:23 he's writing, and he presses send at 5:01:33, there's a good chance it'll be in my Webmail at 5:01:35. All of this means, that if I check my mail at 5:01:30, then again at 5:01:33, and finally at 5:01:36, I'll have something new in my inbox that third time. In any case, it's not completely illogical to check your email every three seconds if you're dependent on instant gratification (and what is the Internet, if not that?). The caveat of course, is that it's very hard to predict when exactly my friend will decide to write me, so it may very well be fruitless to check my email every three seconds... But I'll never know unless I go and check my email (wait a second while I go do that....)

Wow! Totally out of the blue I got an email. (Really, I didn't think I would get one--it was supposed to be funny...) Gee, now there's no lesson to my story. Apparently checking your email every three seconds is not completely futile. But, now that I've gotten that email (and what a happy email 'twas) I don't need to. I've gotten enough email satisfaction to last me at least for the next 3600 seconds or so, so I think I'll go enjoy the sunlight.