“Hi, my name is Melissa, and I’m addicted to information.”

“Hiiiiiiiiiiii, Melissa.“

What is the first thing I do in the morning? Check my Gmail. What do I do after I blow-dry my hair but before I get dressed? Check my Google Reader. What do I do while I’m eating breakfast? Chat on instant messenger, browse Facebook, and review the Google Analytics data from the day before. What do I do ALL DAY LONG? Read Twitter.

RSS feeds feed my addiction. (No pun intended. Okay, intended.) But at the same time, they also quench it. Using a feed reader keeps a steady stream of information flowing in, so when I check in to see what’s new, I’m never disappointed.

The problem is, I have trouble tearing myself away at the end of the night. I literally lose sleep over this. Not that I sleep much to begin with, but when I load Google Reader right before bed, it’s literally like opening up Pandora’s Box.

It starts with, Oh, I’ll just have a quick click around. You know, see if any of my absolutely-must-reads have been updated yet.

Open a link here, open a link there.

But open tabs lead to more open tabs. Which inevitably lead to even more open tabs.

And then suddenly, I start to suffer from The Curse of the Never-Ending Open Tabs.

If the internet is a portal through which I explore the world, then a tabbed browser is like a black hole. Or a vortex. Either way, once I go in, I never seem to come out on the other side.

On that note, I’m consciously choosing to ignore the 27 tabs I currently have open in my browser and am going to bed instead.

Night night.