Tom Rupp commentary: Too many choices, not enough time

Like many of us these days, I get the bulk of my news from certain web pages that are sent to my email every day, something like the old-time newspaper used to do. Now, we still hold onto that tradition as well, getting the Wall Street Journal each morning. Ozzy goes out and fetches it, brings it in, gets a treat. If we get a printer, we will switch purely to digital and Carol can just print her crossword every day. But not for now. I get 1440 Daily Digest, "the best unbiased news source." It brings some of the big stories of the day, but what I especially like about this page are the various links in the Etcetera section at the bottom. There's always something interesting among them. I also get The Morning Brew, again with the main news stories containing no recognizable bias for or against any specific person or party. But like the previous web page, this one offers their "To-Do List" at the bottom that includes about eight links of miscellaneous interest to visit. Are you seeing a pattern here? For the writer/reader, I also receive the Literary Hub, stories from the world of writing and reading. Once a week, I get James Clear's "3-2-1." He is the author of "Atomic Habits" and this page is a nice jolt, as is Tim Ferriss' "5-Bullet Friday." There are more web pages. many more. But these are all I get regularly and they are enough. In fact, I am often unable to look at them all. It's information overload. Every year, Carol gives up something for Lent, the 40 days before Easter. And almost every year, she gives up chocolate. But this year, she gave up scrolling, something she especially does with Instagram. I don't get Instagram. There are too many choices, so one must be selective. Every once in a while, I go through and adjust the pages that come my way. It is said there are three aspects of aging: The first includes the young-old, then the old, and finally the old-old. We viable members of the young-old cohort often have one foot in the old and one in the new. It is hard to eventually let go of what you have been used to for decades. But so it goes as the news keeps coming. What a time to be alive. Tom Rupp is a Folsom resident and weekly Telegraph columnist. You can reach him at truppfolsom@yahoo.com.