|
September 26, 2006 Without a ’netSo I had this brilliant (ahem) idea. I’ve been feeling lost, unsure of what I want to do with myself, and very unproductive. I realized that I spend a lot of time on the computer, but I have nothing to show for it. Rather than make decisions and take action, I distract myself with the abundance of time-consuming activities on the Internet. Best way to “fix” that is take away the distraction, right? Mmm hmm. Apparently, aliens –Internet hating evil aliens - possessed me and they “told” me to give it up for thirty days. “Thirty days without the distraction and you’ll come out a better woman”, the little #*&*!#’s said. So, I notified my friends online that they should use the phone if they needed me, I spent my last night on the Internet voraciously devouring blogs, gossip, news, message board posts, etc…and then I shut it off. My ground rules (which I fully admit are flexible and have been evolving according to whim and psychotic episode) were as follows:
Truthfully, it wasn’t very well thought out and really I shouldn’t be allowed near important life-altering decisions without legal counsel and let’s face it, a therapist in attendance wouldn’t hurt either. What follows is my diary of week one. Not surprisingly, week one was a little tough.
Wednesday Spent the first few hours ignoring the computer entirely. Spent the next few approaching it out of habit and stomping my foot and swearing every time. I had no idea how many events in a day are a precursor to computer time! Coffee’s ready? (Because caffeine is the new Internet, I can only give up one thing at a time.) Sit at the computer. All ready to go pick up the kids, with five minutes to spare? Check the weather. Finished on the phone? Go check the email. It just goes on and on. Already, problems have arisen. Somehow I chose to start this endeavor on the day that roadwork is being completed on my street and I will not be allowed to leave for most of the day. Not necessarily the best scenario, trust me. Also, my daughter’s teacher from last year lives down the road and we spoke last night on the phone regarding the idiotic request for us all to “park on a neighboring street” and just hoof it that last mile home. I have to email her today with the time that they started the work so she’ll know if she can get home after work! Ok so I set up my email not to send or receive without my requesting it, and I sent an email out to her without checking for incoming. I spent the morning going through piles of paperwork I’ve been putting off, so that felt good. I also baked a cake to stick in the freezer for my daughter’s birthday this weekend, because the worlds collided and messed everything up and now I have to produce a cake with dolphins on it all on my own. I hate decorating cakes, not to mention that I’m really, really bad at it. Knowing my limitations, I can’t leave the baking and the decorating until Friday. Problem number two arose when I wanted to refer to a web page with cake mix additives (moister, fluffier, etc, etc), a page on the Internet, of course. I decided I should be allowed to get recipes because it’s not fair to make my family suffer from my decisions. Rule #4: Recipes are fair game.
Thursday Today I started an Eye on Prime Time column since I’m already seeing that I suddenly have more time for, and interest, in watching TV. I had to check some names and spellings, but I used my legal sites and avoided anything extra. Today has been a bit easier; I kept busy trying to catch up on General Hospital episodes. Met the husband for lunch, and visited the cake store to find dolphin stuff. I feel like I’m kind of getting the hang of the whole thing, I’m not approaching the computer nearly as often as yesterday. One of the hardest things is not checking the online newspaper site – I only get it delivered in paper form on the weekends. I feel really out of touch. I suppose staying away from that stuff can only be a stress-reliever though, so I’m trying not to declare a rule #5: Checking the news is allowed for the safety of my family. I can tell you there’s no way my husband is going to keep track of where the serial arsonist seems to be targeting next! I’m sure it’s fine though. I have plenty of time to sniff for smoke now that I have nothing else to do for fun.
Friday I know I said email checks once a week, but today is a friend’s birthday and goodness knows I didn’t think ahead enough to mail a card out, so I’m cheating a bit. I checked email today, sent birthday greetings, thoroughly read through every email, and found nothing to respond to. That’s okay though, I learned a few things from some very informative spam emails, and Netflix wanted my opinion on a few things, so it’s all good. Speaking of Netflix, I have to add that to the legal sites for obvious reasons. I have promised myself though that none of the legal sites are for slow perusal. I get in, get it done, and get out. Every time. I made the cake, and it turned out cute. If my camera starts working again and releases the pictures I took, I’ll post one. That took up most of the day - which was otherwise uneventful. I forgot to mention that I’ve also been checking the weather online. It is decreed that no one, NO ONE, should have to live without that knowledge. I can live without the newspaper (oooh, my father-in-law informed me tonight that the arsonist was caught, so my chances of survival went up this week, yay me!) but dressing the kids for school without weather info in September in Michigan is just not going to happen. Besides, let’s not be nuts here. It’s just the forecast. I’m totally not over justifying either. Am not.
Saturday Okay, here’s the thing. My house is not any cleaner or more organized. I’m not any more caught up on laundry. The dog isn’t more satiated by all the extra affection and walks (because there haven’t been any). I haven’t written much except a portion of a primetime column and this little accounting of my time. What do I do with all my extra time, you ask? Mostly I guess I’ve been watching 5000 General Hospital episodes from the DVR. I was way behind, and if I wish to write a Mercurial column in this century, I have to catch up. I’m not really certain how sitting on the couch watching television is better than surfing the Internet – at least on the ’net there’s a chance I’ll learn something other than the fine art of cheating on my wife (badly, I might add) with a drug pushing brat child. However, this is part of the plan and I suppose sooner or later I’ll catch up on the twenty or so episodes that I’m behind on and then I’ll have to do something else with my time. Probably this is also part of a little rebellion against myself. I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t hatch a stupid plan and then hate the whole thing and refuse to go along with it.
Sunday Last night I googled some stuff. It was my husband’s fault really, he was looking up some family history stuff and I doubted his ability to google appropriately, so I had to try for myself after he came up empty. I wonder if google should be capitalized when used as a verb? Not like I can look it up. Today was the daughter’s actual birthday so we went bowling (her activity of choice). Haven’t bowled in years and years. By the third game I worked my way up to a 74. That’s WITH two strikes mind you. So probably I won’t join a bowling league to take up my extra time over the next month. Now my arm hurts. I remember once upon a time my arm muscles hurt from mouse clicking. *Sniff* I’m feeling a little emotional of late, but overall, I’m doing well. I really think I might be able to do this. Some days I really, really want to just toss it and check up on a certain message board or catch up on my EOS friends’ writing, but so far I come to my senses in time. Late at night is the worst time, usually when I can’t sleep I hit the computer. Instead I’m back to watching late night television. I’m also watching tabloid shows for celebrity gossip, just in case. It would not be funny if I missed an important event like Tom Cruise admitting that little visit with Brooke Shields recently was really about thanking her for giving him and Katie the best gift ever. Same hospital, same day…a coincidence? I don’t think so. She totally could’ve had twins and been frightened to within an inch of her life by talk of postpartum times two. You just never know. Also, FYI, Ted Turner is sexy. No laughing at my embarrassing celebrity crushes, a girl needs them in a time like this. No idea why I never noticed before but it’s true, he is sexy. Watching him and Letterman discuss how women should rule the whole world last week? Well, my night was complete.
Monday How has no one noticed that I’m not on the computer nearly as much? I didn’t tell anyone around here what I was doing; I thought it would be a nice pleasant surprise. Not so much it appears. They HAVEN’T NOTICED. Here I thought I was depriving my family of my time and attention. Whatever. I don’t think the kids have seen me on the computer at all. The little things I’ve had to do on here have been when they’re at school for the most part. I did do that google thing with my husband (oooh, that sounds kind of bad doesn’t it, lol?) so he maybe can’t be completely blamed but still. He totally should have noticed the lack of “Be right back, gotta go to the bathroom” thing that takes twice as long as it should while I check the email or whatever. This is all rather disappointing. He’s out of town at the moment, so I suppose he could’ve been distracted by the upcoming trip and maybe thought I was just putting aside the Internet to spend extra quality time (pfft) but I dunno. I’ll bet Ted Turner would notice. It’s a little tougher being home alone and not getting on the computer. Thank God I wasn’t possessed to do this before the new television season started, I seriously wouldn’t have lasted 24 hours. I’ve decided that Tuesday will be the regular email-checking day (yeah, yeah, I know it hasn’t been a week since Friday – it’s just a scheduling thing, can’t be helped!). I really hope someone has something interesting to say, because my non-computer life is seriously lacking in adult interaction. Probably by week four of this crap I’ll have turned to hanging out at the mall trolling for new friend prospects. I thought if I wasn’t able to spout off my thoughts at any given time of the day or night at the click of the mouse then maybe I’d be more apt to write them in a column, but I’m not so sure anymore. Maybe I’ll my brain will just shrivel up without the stimulation of the Internet!
Tuesday Well, I’m putting this entry in early – the day is only half over. House is still a mess, but the plan is to kick off the “better organized, new improved interested in housekeeping” me later today, after I get this sent off, post the primetime column even though it’s not finished, and (wooooo!) check the email. Today is okay I guess. Late last night was tough, I couldn’t sleep at all and really, really wanted a fix. ;) I was awake until 3:45am, tossing and turning. Guess that means tonight will be better since I’ll be exhausted. Last night I completely caught up on GH! One thing is certain; soaps are way more interesting when you have nothing else to do. I completely cried myself through some of it even. Between that, the ER season opener, and the Little House on the Prairie where Charles’ father tries suicide by setting his cabin afire, it’s been really sniffly around here. You might think “thank goodness she already heard that the arsonist was caught so the Little House episode didn’t cause nightmares” and you’d have been right, up until this morning when I heard on the radio that apparently there was more than one arsonist and the other one is still at large. So now I’m sorry I watched *that*. This is better than spending my time reading a snarky recap of Celebrity Fit Club why again? Heeeeeeelp! I guess if I go completely crazy and steal a fire truck to park in front of my house (for my own safety!) the good news will be that at least I won’t have to read about my insane ass in the newspaper, right? Rule #…5? Where did I leave off? Whatever. If I do something rash and it appears that jail is imminent, I’m allowed to email my friends to say goodbye even if it isn’t Tuesday.
Always
love to hear from you! Want More of Sherry's Work? |
