The times they are a-changin’.
This post seems to be older than 12 years—a long time on the internet. It might be outdated.
I gave up Facebook and Twitter for Lent.
Well, I gave up most of Facebook1 and Twitter for Lent. I’m allowing myself five minutes of time on Facebook and Twitter each day (total for the both of them, and no rollover minutes). And even then, the only reason I’m doing that is because there are still some critical communications and event planning that occur through them. I don’t want to be completely antisocial, you know. I also want to be able to respond to @ reply’s on Twitter. So the five minute limit is really just designed so I can get in, do what I need to do, and get out.
I figured this was a good thing to give up for Lent because I found myself constantly checking Facebook and Twitter even when I had no good reason to. Basically, if I was bored or didn’t have anything fun to do (which should not be confused with not having anything to do) I would check those sites. The most annoying thing was that I found myself doing that the first thing in the morning while eating breakfast. I would sit there in my pajamas, eating my cereal, scrolling through the Facebook updates with one finger on my Android phone.
And so it was.
Yesterday, I went to Costco to get some supplies and made a somewhat big-for-me purchase (it was $50…not that big I suppose, but still). I got home and broke my new toy out of its packaging and thought about posting something witty about it on Twitter. I started thinking about what I could say in 140 characters or less.
Then I remembered that I couldn’t. Because I gave it up for Lent2. I actually kind of felt sad! That’s when I knew that giving up Twitter was probably a good idea.
I also think Twitter — and even Facebook to some degree — have contributed to my lack of posting here. Why write out 300, or 750, or even 1500 words on something when I can be lazy and write 140 characters?
This brings me to by big announcement: I bought a paper shredder, which makes me feel like an adult. But oh how I like to shred!3
Now, the whole irony of this thing is that new posts on my blog get automatically tweeted to Twitter, and then pushed to Facebook. But that’s pretty much the only activity you’re going to see from me on Facebook and Twitter until April 24th.
Anyone else give anything up?
0which is quite incredible considering that just give years ago I passed up on giving up Facebook for Lent because “I’m really not that into Facebook (I might check it every three days or so)“…Facebook, you time sucking bastard. ↩
who’s silly idea was that? ↩
90 characters ↩