I’ve been busy recently, weeks of long days and no weekends. As a freelancer I am, of course, obliged to say how glad I am of the work – though I must admit I do enjoy doing absolutely bugger all and, poverty aside, that’s what I’d do all the time. But to be idle, it seems, is to be indulging in the worst excesses of modern life: it is not viewed as useful, private, mental space, but as wasteful and feckless.
Sloth is capitalism’s least favourite vice. Fortunes are spent encouraging all the other deadly sins – lust, gluttony and envy are well represented on every billboard and TV channel. Yet sloth! ‘Don’t encourage that or the fuckers might actually take five minutes to think about the treadmill we’ve got them on.’
