At some point on William Gibson's now defunct micro blog*, he's about to embark on the book tour for Pattern Recognition (so circa 2003).

I'll butcher his insightful phrasing, but he remarks to the effect of

> I think I'm going to stop blogging. The act of sitting at a laptop and writing these posts seems incompatible with my life as it exists on a book tour. The only free moments available for it to occupy would be ones where I'm sitting, momentarily caught between two scheduled activities and staring off into space. I have a suspicion these moments are crucial for my soul. So, until we meet again.

The comingled ambiguousness and specificity of the observation stuck with me.

* https://web.archive.org/web/20070123212506/http://www.willia...

"All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone." -Blaise Pascal

And mostly reduced creativity.

I'm addicted to reading, I take my kindle and phone everywhere, so will grab them when I'm walking, taking a shower, waiting in line, going to the restroom... Between my kindle and my phone, I read a lot more books than I ever did but I don't digest the information as much as I used to. I also don't make as much associations between what I read and things going on in my own life. So, in a way, despite reading a lot more, I don't think I benefit as much from it.

Now, I'm purposefully forcing myself not to reach to my kindle when taking a walk so that my mind can wander as much as I do.