Kicking the Warcrack habit; Back to Ubuntu

I hadn't booted my Ubuntu partition in a couple of months, so after a sleepless night this morning seemed like the perfect opportunity to do so.

I stopped using Ubuntu for a foolish reason: World of Warcraft was consuming a horrendous amount of my time and I couldn't get it to run properly in Linux.

That's right, I said it. I was addicted to World of Warcraft. It has stolen over three months of my recent life and I let it. I fell into a terrible funk at the end of October and Warcraft came along and fed on my vulnerability.

Every day for the last three months I have faithfully logged into my account, slayed monsters and fought in battlegrounds all in a futile attempt to elevate myself above "noob" status. What do I have to show for it? One lost friendship, ten extra pounds and a hefty feeling of regret.

I woke up yesterday and finally realized for myself that my Warcrack habit was stupid. Halle-freakin-lujah. Just wish I would have woke up to that fact at least two days earlier so I didn't have to shell out another $15. Better late then never.

I am a fantastic procrastinator. Some of my best work has been done in the waning moments of a deadline. It's so much easier to play a couple more rounds of Freecell than to stop and brainstorm or pick up the phone and make that first dreaded call of the day. To combat my natural tendency to slack, I installed a Ubuntu partition on my hard drive.

Ubuntu is so business-like. Fewer games available to play and free productivity applications around every corner. When I boot up my computer to that plain brown wallpaper I actually want to get things done.

So I have affirmations for myself now that I'm freed from the clutches of Azeroth. I'm going to start wearing my bluetooth ear piece and take calls. I'm going to read my e-mail, and better yet, I will respond in a timely manner. I will use Instant Messaging again.

I will pull my eBay box out of my closet and start selling my junk again for bar money.

I will write every day. I will engage in conversation on current events. I will read blogs and comment on thought provoking entries.

I will reconnect with friends and family I have neglected over these past few months.

I will be Michael Beck once again.

Now it's your turn: What's an addiction or habit that you've had to kick and how did you kick it?