I Once Was Lost, but Now I'm Wired

It's a glorious house of worship. The walls are gray, austere, adorned with pictures of important and beloved figures. Icons and talismans from faraway lands lie about, recalling passages of days gone by. A Chinese lantern adds a taste of pageantry, while a gentle murmur emanates from an acolyte.

O.K., so it's my office. A cubicle, actually. The pictures are mine, as are the figurines, but the walls were like this when I got here. The lantern, that's from a restaurant that was going out of business. And the acolyte is really my computer, which, thanks to a variety of new websites,...

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