A Day Without Internet- What to Do?

This post is late, but it is posted nonetheless, which is exceeding expectations for me, I think. :)

So what was my new experience this past week? First off, a quick recap of my new experience from last week because it was fun. My best friend Rachel and I have decided we need to learn to cook, and my mom, being a great cook and a great teacher, decided to help us with this goal. She's giving us weekly cooking lessons, and the first one was last week. We learned how to make a dish inspired by one of my favorite Iranian dishes back from before I was a vegetarian, rice with choresh, that has a real name in Farsi but I don't know it. Anyway, my mom figured out a veg version of it that we call "lemony lentils" and we made it for the first lesson. (This week's lesson was pasta with broccoli. Super delicious.)

Anyway, this week I did something a little different. My mom suggested that I spend one day without Internet. You see, I spend waaaaaaaay too much time on the Internet. In fact, I had a dream last night that I was in a room full of people and a man was asking us all to tell a secret, and my secret was that I'm addicted to the Internet. It's gone a little far. I mean, I know I'm on the Internet now, but this is a blog I'm writing. It's one thing to check my email, listen to music, write my blog, and keep in touch with friends- it's another to scroll Tumblr for HOURS on end.

I corrupted my mother by introducing her to Buzzfeed a few years ago, and she realized that her Internet habits were beginning to get a little too close to mine. So, because she's actually responsible, she decided to spend one day a week without going on the computer. She chose Saturday, which lines up with Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest. Technically, we're not supposed to use any technology, but our family's not that religious. Still, just abstaining from using the computer does make the day better.

So she asked me, this Saturday, to try and not use the computer for a whole day. I thought to myself, "yeah, OK, I won't let you see me use the computer for a whole day." In the morning, I checked my Skype and saw I had 380 messages, then I decided, you know what, I can try this no-Internet thing for one day. Just until the sun sets and Shabbat is technically over.

So I closed the computer after two minutes of looking at Skype, and then commenced my day without Internet. And here is what I did:

• Tried on a great new flowy dress. It's one of those fancy kinds that has a really long flowy skirt. I'm bad at describing clothes. But it was fun to wear.
• Looked at old photo albums. My parents have taken literally tens of thousands of photos of me and my sister, I'm pretty sure. And before we went digital, my mom would sort through the photos and pick the best ones to stick in old albums and put funny captions underneath. So I got to see cute baby me, cute toddler me, and cute baby Shir (my little sister, who photobombed half my nice photos). And my mom told me stories of me and my sister as kids.
• Lay on my bed for a while and whined about not having Internet.
• Finished a really good book, Shadow and Bone. (You're likely to hear about it in an upcoming post where I do Part 2 of my book review series.)
• Went on a walk with my dad to a nearby park. I've been walking with my mom every day this summer so I'm a little more in shape than I was before, which isn't saying much, since I was in horrible shape before. Still fun, though. We went to the park and looked at the trees and talked and stuff. On the way there, my dad spotted what he thought was an edible mushroom attached to a tree. He took a photo of it and put it on his mushroom-lovers Facebook group. (Yes, this is a real thing.) On the way back, the group had responded that it looked like an edible mushroom called the Chicken of the Wood. So we Googled that mushroom and compared the two and then we concluded that it was probably safe and harvested some to take home. He later ate some of it. I did not, because I'm not that adventurous.
• Watched the movie Big Fish. I've already seen it, but it's a fun movie. It's directed by Tim Burton but it's not, like, a Tim Burton movie. It's really good. It's about stories and things, and there's a crap-ton of good actors.
• Made myself two good meals (besides the cold pizza I had for breakfast, the best meal of all): Triscuits with goat cheese and blackberries for lunch, and a sandwich for dinner consisting of avocado, tomatoes, red onions, spinach, feta, and honey mustard on homemade garlic-rosemary bread. Yum.
• Made my family watch Parks and Recreation with me. My dad hates Season 1 so I said we could skip to Season 2. For those trying to convert their loved ones to the ways of Parks and Rec, this is usually the most efficient strategy. Season 1 is uphill work, but Season 2 is endearingly awkward.

After that, it was like 8 PM, and the sun hadn't set but I thought it was late enough, and I returned to the Internet. And naturally skipped my blog post, because I had a WHOLE DAY of doing nothing to catch up on! Still, it was great to not go on the Internet. I got to spend time with my family and do all that aforementioned stuff.  And I tend to be in a better mood when I'm not agitated the whole time wondering what Tumblr posts I'm missing out on that I need to get directly back to. So that's good.

Despite this, it should be a long time before I really give up on my Internet addict ways. I'm not exactly great at recovery. This was still a good experience, though.

Thanks for reading! See you on Wednesday for a post about my dad's weird new diet (he wants to promote it.)
-Ariel