Requiem for a little laptop

A nasty headcold drove me  to my bed on Saturday morning where I shivered for most of the day. Today, Tuesday, is ny first day out of bed, still coughing and with my husband crossing his forefingers against me everytime I do it. It's his birthday today, and the poor man is sanding skirting boards prior to painting them instead of having a jolly day out.
Still, we have our new chairs to sit in, and though they took twelve weeks to arrive, they are lovely. Beige leather and wood, so comfortable, and so good for the spine. Our living room looks very different without the big three-seater sofa that took up so much space.

One thing I have become aware of while I've been tucked up in bed is that I'm receiving too many e-mails. With time to think about it, I realised I was keeping three computers  going (don't ask - two "old" laptops that haven't quite hit the dustbin because they still function, though very slowly, and once they were top of their line....and it seems just cruel to abandon them). The smallest laptop bravely tried to download 1571 e-mails that had collected since the 28th April, and stuttered to a halt on a particular e-mail which it declared the server had refused to pass on.  The other laptop, which had Norton installed, took that particular e-mail in its stride and moved blithely on, but I fear the little one may be defunct for ever.

I tried to reload the e-mails on the little laptop *seven* times through the day, thinking the server would relent and send the message through or ignore it but no, the same grind to a halt occurred every time. As I watched those messages roll in and then deleted them, it became clear that most of them were not necessary - congratulations, heartfelt pleas for prayers for someone I don't know when I'm not a praying person anyway, promos, repetitions of things already said, just the normal everyday chitchat that we're told to avoid when writing our novels! Though it's kind of nice to feel part of the group, I've come to the conclusion that less is more in this case, so I shall be scrutinising each and every group for its - well, not value for money, but value for time, I suppose. Will I cut them off totally? I suppose not, but I shall certainly limit them in some way. That way I might just get more writing done.