A million frustrations crowd my mind like expanding popcorn kernels in a bag of microwave popcorn–all when my mind is supposed to empty of me and lift up praise to God above. I try to sing the words of the songs, but they seem empty and hollow. The next thing I know my lips are singing the words and my mind is contemplating the best time to reinstall the operating system on my computer. I’ll only have my high speed network connection for so much longer, so I should do it soon while it’s still easy to download programs from the internet. This summer I should have lots of time. I should probably buy some more zip disks so I can back everything up. That could be expensive. Maybe I can clean up the zip disks I have and condense my files. That one disk is full of stuff from the old computer–I should be able to delete everything on there. All the while a thousand voices are echoing in worship to God. I try to focus, I try to empty my head of these crowding thoughts, but it doesn’t work. We sing another song and I think of a band and a concert long ago. That triggers another memory that reminds me of another band who may soon be breaking up. I should be sure I get to their final few shows. Back to the first band, and I realize I haven’t visited their web page in a while. I wonder if they’re on tour right now? All the while someone is reading about the Israelites and how God didn’t want their offerings and sacrifices given for the sake of offerings and sacrifices. He wanted the people. Maybe I shouldn’t be here. A thousand more thoughts crowd in and I succumb to the insanity. Is this what it’s like to be a product of the sound-byte generation?