I get this weird feeling too... of not keeping up, of this idea that I might be missing something...

This Is Your Brain On Tech / With a mind crammed with gizmo jargon, where's the room for sex and love and deep, earthly knowing?:

"Can you keep up? Can you process it all? Because if you desire to partake of the modern world and take full advantage of its manic all-consuming gizmo joys, you pretty much have to. A functional understanding of such hyperactive tech data is the modern requirement, the mandatory condition of urban existence. Participate, or fumble and stumble by the wayside as new possibilities for communication and invention and frustration race by, and you're stuck standing there, pining for rotary telephones, pondering a time before digital toasters, thinkin' 'bout naps.

...Verily, as I race through the mad wonderland of modern tech like Mary-Kate Olsen through a bottle of tequila, am I limiting my ability to learn, once in my life, the fine art of dendrology? Orchid taxonomies? Whale song? Do I still have sufficient intellectual space to learn conversational French or to bake superlative croque monsieurs or build my own fine oak furniture? Is it too late? Am I frying all my wiring? Or maybe, just maybe, helping it all function better?

...But you also might wonder what the hell is happening to my short-attention-span mind as I learn, as fast as my brain will allow, the 14,000 functions of my Canon Digital Rebel, or how to process photos in RAW format (which, by the way, I have zero need to do but oh my God I don't want to not know such a thing because gosh what if I want to suddenly become a pro photog and start shooting more than just snapshots of family and dogs and my girlfriend in the shower? Such is the odd peer-pressure of techdom).

You might wonder whether it's all worthwhile, or if I am, in fact, going partially insane. But one thing is sure: We would both stand in awe at the power and range of the human brain, our seemingly infinite capacity to learn and evolve and fire up new synapses to put it all together into some sort of frantic, kaleidoscopic tapestry. Hell, the fact that we can still function amid all of this gorgeous and maddening tech noise, not to mention (in my case) still think reasonably clearly and write semi-coherent sentences and pay my bills and have multi-angled sex with my SO and still remain upright, is indeed a testament to the variegated genius of the human animal. And also, of course, to wine.

But it is not enough. It is never, ever enough. Flipping through the broadband digital cable TV feed the other night, I caught a random home-remodeling show, all about how to turn this ugly little room in this upscale little house into a sexy little den, all recessed ceilings and stone shelving and this amazing tile flooring with a round ornamental centerpiece in the middle, and oh my freaking God, the range of knowledge of basic materials and techniques and tools, just to install some goddamn flooring, was like listening to a docent at the Louvre explain Matisse to a child. I mean, how can I learn all that? Where will I possibly put it all? When do I start?

And when, pray tell, do I get to put it all down and take a deep breath and just go read a damn book?"