The Times casts light on that tragicomic modern phenomenon: couples who lie in bed blogging with laptops. I am in bed right now! John complains that he's reading comic books and not doing something weird like blogging, but whatevs:
Larry Smith knows he is treading a fine marital line. Mr. Smith, 37, is the editor of Smith, an online magazine he founded, and he loves to work in bed at all hours — midafternoon, 2 a.m. if insomnia strikes, then again in the morning.
Sitting there in bed half awake with a cup of coffee is extremely pleasant,” he said.Yet Mr. Smith is all too aware of his wife’s mounting disapproval of his routine and suspects that a laptop-in-bed ban could be imminent.
Luckily John and I don't have this problem, because we're both blogging! Like these people:
Dr. Enoch Choi, 36, and his wife, Tania, 33, who have been married 10 years, both take laptops to bed to write their blogs. “I suppose I started the trend,’’ said Dr. Choi, a physician in Palo Alto, Calif. “But now my wife is just as much the nighty-night PowerBook key-banger, blogging away for her friends.”
Freaks. And I can't believe that having said "nighty-night PowerBook key-banger" he wasn't able to get a Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers joke in there somehow. Step it up, Enoch.
Woo-hoo! More fun with the cool Styles column.
Posted by: The Modesto Kid | August 25, 2006 at 11:39 PM
Oh my, Medmusings!
Posted by: coturnix | August 26, 2006 at 01:35 AM
Shocking! Terrible! Obviously THIS is destroying Marriage more effectively than the Gay Agenda!
In my superior marriage, we do no such thing. Here are our tips for saving your marriage:
1. Never take the laptops to bed. Laptops are for spending the evening and well into the wee hours of the morning on the couch and in front of the television. Remember: Familiarity breeds contempt, and the dual distraction of the laptop and whatever's on the TiVo will keep things fresh. If you MUST communicate with your spouse, do so only through IM.
2. Both spouses blogging regularly is a mistake. One spouse should act as the purveyor of opinion on all shared activities and incidents. My husband HAS a blog, but only I update regularly. This has led to some undesirable direct communication:
Spouse: Hey! You never blogged about X.
Me: Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't notice the head injury and broken arms that prevent you from blogging about X, my love.
Tense moments, to be sure, but isn't it best to confront these marital difficulties head on if they cannot be confronted laterally with a broad-spectrum IM client?
Posted by: CMD | August 26, 2006 at 01:52 AM
I have to admit, if I was trying to sleep and my husband was sitting up in bed at 2 a.m. clicking away on his computer, it would cause quite a bit of frostiness in our marriage, too. Especially when he clicked onto a site that he didn't realize until too late had a noisy ad.
Posted by: Mnemosyne | August 27, 2006 at 02:34 AM
I would never let John be on the computer while I'm trying to sleep, because I'm a very light sleeper. he can fall asleep just fine while I'm using the laptop but it doesn't happen often.
Posted by: belle waring | August 27, 2006 at 09:14 PM