where do brain cells go to die?

I am an intelligent person with quite a bit of education and yet on a daily basis I find I am stumped for words. Or I find myself stumbling over words, searching for wit or candor or subtlety. I can remember when I was an excellent conversationalist and I was quite an eloquent correspondent. I believe this all began to change when I finished my master's. (Or shortly thereafter.) I found that I had little chance in every day life outside of academia to excercise my brain. As a result I think that my brain cells are one by one starving to death. However, my skull does not seem to be caving in, so I wonder, where have these brain cells gone to die? Or are they simply dormant waiting for me to nourish them again. Why is it so much harder to educate yourself outside of the classroom? The usual answers of time and motivation are obvious. Time I think really is the biggest obstacle. I don't seem to have time to read a whole book, so I have donesized to magazine articles. Two-three pages maximum and I am on to the next task. Even with this smaller intake of information, I seem to not have enough time - as evidenced by the stack of as yet unread magazines by my bed. Sometimes I wish I could read and learn by osmosis. I would put a book under my pillow at night and in the morning I would have absorbed all that was in it. Not only practical in the sense of saving time, but also eliminating eye strain! At any rate, I will hence forth endeavor to stay sharp and not lose the rest of my brain cells to malnutrition.