Years ago I grew up (I told you it was years) in a house that was a slightly larger duplicate of a house three doors away. From the landing at the top of the stairs, where three more steps on the left led to the bedrooms, the loveliest room in the house lay over the garage. It featured built-in bookcases on either side of the (electric) fireplace and our neighbours added more shelves on the opposite wall of the room where they stored their massive, decades-long collection of the National Geographic magazine. One day the den left the house.

As I told you, the room was over the garage, without foundation, that is, there was no basement under the garage. The weight of the magazines bowed down the room and forced it to separate from the more securely anchored part of the house. That affected my feelings for National Geographic for the rest of my life.

I buy and read the occasional issue that interests me and have even kept one (on the Vikings) but I have avoided buying a subscription, fearing the outcome. Too dangerous.

Yes, well, if only I could apply that caution to other collections.

For years I loved the Sunday New York Times. Friends who knew me knew better than to disturb me for most of the day on Sundays because I was committed to the NYT. When I went on my huge cruise last year, finally I had to change my ways. I realized that the paper could not be delivered to my stateroom on board a ship, so I signed up for it online – daily. Now I can’t quit. Another addiction has snuck up on me. It has wrecked my mornings, I mean every morning. And not being able to swim for two months on account of my injured leg hasn’t helped. This is worse than a room pulling away from a house. This is me, pulling away from my self.

This is addiction.

Has anyone else been beguiled into watching those awful side-trips on Google inviting you to look at the Hollywood stars with surprising high IQs, or to shudder at the botched plastic surgeries or the ravages of age and or obesity or to find out whatever happened to so-an-so? Quite apart from the voyeuristic “thrill” (?) – more like a frisson – the morbid curiosity that lures one into these divergent explorations can be damaging. Suddenly, you have spent an hour cruising gossipy horror stories, wasting time you cannot afford to lose. At least, I can’t. You are teetering on the edge of addiction. I mean, I am.

Deal with it.

When I bought my newest computer (not my last, I’m sure) I forswore Games. I pretended that the new machine did not provide such distractions and I never looked. I had been spending more and more time with Free Cell and someone had just introduced me to the Spider series. Best to leave them alone. Best to shut my eyes to something before it gets a grip on one’s soul.

You think I’m being over-dramatic?

The theory is that it takes 28 days to make a habit, but that’s a good habit. I think it takes about a day to acquire a bad one and then 28 days to lose it, if ever. I don’t want to risk it. I have to be careful now.

I was going to make a joke: be careful not to check on celebrities’ bad habits. But it wasn’t a joke. I looked to see if such a lead existed, and of course, it did, so I looked at a series of not necessarily bad habits but peculiar ones. Did you know that Mariah Carey eats purple food three days a week: eggplant, plums, grapes…. Do you believe that?

Be careful!