Category Archives: Social Media

Experiment

Social Media

I am trying an experiment. I’m staying off all social media for the foreseeable future. The reasons are many — the upcoming election is one. I’ve noticed that I am so much more anxious lately, and I think that’s because I’ve been hanging out on Threads a lot lately and my feed is full of other anxious people which fuels my anxiety. I also mistakenly replied to a negative post about Kamala Harris on my mom’s magat cousin’s page which made me anxious, mostly since my magat brother and magat cousin replied (I didn’t read what they wrote), I just saw the notification. I unfollowed my mom’s cousin and turned off notifications of replies on that post. (I unfollowed my brother and cousin long ago).

Another reason is that I spend far too much time on Threads. It was always the first thing I looked at when I unlocked my phone, including in the middle of the night when I couldn’t sleep. I’d scroll and read for hours.

I’ve always known that social media is bad for me but I didn’t realize just how bad it was until lately. I felt like I had friends out there because sometimes they would respond to me or like something I wrote.

They are not my friends.

I now wonder how long it will take me to stop mentally writing a social media post in my head after an insignificant thought. Or how long before I stop thinking of insignificant questions to ask my followers on Threads or Facebook.

My plan is to one-by-one delete my social media accounts, starting with ones I never use (Bluesky, Mastodon, Twitter). Then ones I use like Threads and Instagram. I’ll keep Facebook because of the few people with whom that is about the only way I interact with them, but I will severely prune my friends list.

Death notices

Death, Social Media

How do you learn about the death of someone you know or have known? Right now for me I usually learn about someone’s passing through Facebook. In the past several months I’ve heard about at least five deaths through Facebook: A dear friend I met at college died from a stroke in March or April, but I read about it on his Facebook page months later. Another friend, one who I’d only met once, but felt very close to died mysteriously in May and it was posted on his Facebook page. Two of my mom’s friends, one of whom I’d become close to in the previous year, died last year — I learned of their deaths on Facebook too. Just yesterday I learned (via by brother via Facebook) that my late cousin’s widow (now remarried) died.

I’m asking you this because when I told my husband (Dean) about the cousin-by-marriage’s death (someone we both admired and thought was very sweet) his reaction was not, “Oh, that’s sad. I always liked Deb.” but “How did Kevin (my brother) find out? and when I said, “Facebook” he was surprised (and sounded disaproving).

I used to hear about the deaths of family members or family friends through my mom. Now, other than Facebook, Kevin will occassionally text me or FB message me. I guess Dean gets his notifications through his family and maybe he figures that it doesn’t matter if people die and he doesn’t know about it, especially if he has had no interaction with those people in a long time.

Maybe that’s the difference between us. I like connections, no matter if they are online or offline (but online has been easier for me ever since there was an online), and if one of those connections is lost through death I want to know. I might not do much about it except write a condolence message to the family in a comment, but I want to know so I can think about that person and what they meant to me.

All of this said, I would not want to hear about the death of a close friend or family member on Facebook — which is why, when my parents died I made sure to call people it mattered to before it leaked onto Facebook. I very nearly learned about my Aunt Ginny’s death on Facebook, but luckily for me Uncle Jack called me.

As much as Facebook has its faults, it does have some features, and providing personal news is one of them.

Random thoughts about COVID-19

Musings, People, Rant, Rave, Social Media, , ,

Listen to Tony

Listen to whatever Anthony Fauci says. He’s likely the leading expert in this right now. He is the director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). Over the past couple of weeks we’ve had friends and family ask my husband, (who works at NIAID) what he thinks about COVID-19, what he advised them to do. His response has been, “listen to Tony”. As of this afternoon, Dr. Fauci is saying don’t go to restaurants or bars or other crowded places, and of course wash your hands and don’t touch your face.

Also:

“You know, I would prefer as much as we possibly could,” Fauci responded. “I think we should really be overly aggressive and get criticized for overreacting.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, March 15, 2020

Our next crisis might be clogged sewers

Update:UK’s sewage system in danger of gridlock from toilet paper substitutes

With all the panicked toilet paper hording, many people have resorted to buying facial tissues and at least one Facebook friend posted a photo of dinner napkins she bought when she could find no toilet paper. I even heard that one newspaper printed 8 blank pages for emergency toilet paper. Other Facebook friends are discussing what to do when all the paper in the house is used up (take a shower for #2 was one response). My immediate thought is don’t flush those facial tissues or napkins or paper towels. Hell, don’t even flush “flushable personal wipes”.

King Arthur Flour is out of flour

Of course. The hoarders bought up all the flour in stores, but I never would expect the king of flour to run out of flour! But it has. I can deal with no TP but I really need to bake bread. If not for eating, to deal with anxiety.

I deleted my Facebook app

I had a meltdown Friday night after spending the past couple days and several hours on Friday reading articles people posted on Facebook. I was convinced I was going to die and not live to see my retirement date or sit on the brand new deck or in the brand new “lodge” in warm weather. I would tell you what the articles were, but I don’t want you to have a meltdown too. Listen to Tony…

Facebook is not all bad

I did see some amusing things on Facebook today after I recovered from Friday’s meltdown*. My favorite was someone who’d just cleaned out their deep freezer after 20 years: “Threw out old frozen foods, the freeze dried remains of two budgies and ten betta fish, and found where the good glass containers were hiding.” I told them that they should use this as the first line in a short story or novel.

*just because I deleted my app does not mean I am not reading Facebook sometimes…