My name is Peter and I am a cyberaddict. I had my first Internet account at the age of 29. I believe I was hooked the first time I logged in. Initially, it was just a couple of hours each day � one hour in the morning and another in the evening. It was so subtly gradual that I did not realise I was addicted to the Internet until I could not log in for several weeks.

The withdrawal symptoms were awful. I suffered from insomnia, poor appetite, and had a foul temper. I unrestrainedly hammered my computer and modem with the notion that it would get me connected again if I hit them hard enough. That was never successful!

That was five years ago. I am not making any effort cure myself from this addiction. Why! I have even graduated to a broadband connection just to squeeze more digital juice out of my waking hours. Now I can surf all day long for a flat rate of RM88 per month. I still suffer from withdrawal symptoms occasionally when the line goes dead for several hours without any reason. If I was not in a foul mood, I would be wallowing in despair at the dead connection.

I am a cyberaddict and I am enjoying every moment of it. I have no desire to yank myself away from my PC. I have no desire to recover. And I have vowed to get a connection with an even higher bandwidth when it is available and affordable.

I wished I could be more prolific when it comes to blogging. I am lazy by nature � lazy in the sense that I am always looking for the fastest way to get a task done with the least possible steps. And I wished there were ways for me to get my thoughts blogged without having to type it out. Uploading thoughts�

I discovered that the camera zoom lens that I sent for cleaning a while back has a colony of fungus growing on its lens elements again. This is bad news as it costs a bomb to get it cleaned the last time. Another zoom lens has also been afflicted. Pesky little buggers.

I guess it would be cheaper in the long run to trade-in this Canon EOS 500, which I have used to capture many good memories, for a digital camera. That would save me a bundle on films and printing charges. If only I have the moolah for a top-of-the-range digital SLR.

I just found out that my physical disabilities should not be called tetraplegia or quadriplegia. They have a more precise term to refer to my physical condition � tetraparesis or quadriparesis. So now, I officially suffer from tetraparesis and I shall describe myself as such from now on. That is enlightening!

Some may ask what the difference is between tetraparesis and quadriparesis? They both have one and the same meaning � partial paralysis of all the four limbs and loss of sensation from the neck or chest downward. Tetraparesis is British and quadriparesis is American, just like you eat your biscuits and I eat my crackers. The world is such a confusing place.

I have been spending too much time surfing, which is not necessarily a bad thing since I am able to spend my time more productively instead of lazing around and doing nothing. The only drawback is that my feet become swollen after a prolonged period of lower body inactivity. This condition is called oedema. Yes! I am a prime candidate for deep vein thrombosis, too, and I do not even have to fly transatlantic to be afflicted. Wuan has this novel idea to rid the oedema - hang upside down like a bat. If only she can guarantee that my head will not become bloated instead!

I truly and absolutely succumbed to the ultimate in cyber vanity � registering a dotcom in my name. petertan.com is officially online as of February 8, 2003. Wuan had so generously bought the web space for me to move the two homepages I was managing from Geocities to this new domain. Our relationship is a progeny of the bitstream. We met online, and this milestone is momentous to us.