Too dumb to blog

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

Today i am not in a good mood.

Why do I continue to write something no one is interested in?

Not even my own husband has seen this even though he keeps saying he will, the whole point of me deactivating my Facebook profile was to have more time and feel better yet the time I wasted on Facebook, I waste on here, just like Facebook, I get disheartened when even my friends cant be bothered to read what I type…. I think this experiment has lead me to realising in reality, no one cares, unless its juicy gossip or a need to themselves, people are quite selfish.

I think this will be the last blog from me, I needed to do this to realise what time I’m wasting.

Blogging to keep off social networks was a waste of time as I’m racking up the hours just as much as that. Maybe I’m just too dumb to blog.

I’ve decided to deactivate my personal Twitter also, the only ones I’ll have are the ones for my business and to be used that way only. Welcome to the harsh reality of life.

Its been a week…

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

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So, a quick review on how its been a week after no personal Facebook profile…. vile, but getting better.

Why do I sum it up with that word? Because it seems like if you want to have a decent social life, you need to stay connected. If someone is throwing a party, the first thing they do is set up an event and add everyone on their Facebook list, if you’re not on it, chances are you’ve been forgotten.

Every day your reminded about it, bumping into friends saying “hey, did you see status?”, or “find us on Facebook”, or “you really missed out on what happened last night”.

As much as Facebook angered me, I miss it, yet I seem to be filling the addiction with other things such as this blog, game apps, computer gaming and not on productive things like crafting for the business and with the kids, reading like I wanted to. They say the average social networker spends about 7.2 hours a day engaging in something and most of that time being on Facebook, the first couple of days this time really decreased for me but its slowly creeping back up, which wasn’t the plan, but I’m going with the flow to see what happens.

I dont even know if anyone is paying attention to any of my blogs but its nice to be able to type this stuff somewhere.

Mood wise, except contemplating what to do half of the time and wasting the day being bored, my mood has been up and down like a yoyo, one minute I’m feeling low, wanting someone to talk to and no one being available on Skype, I dont like personally vocally talking on the phone, no credit to text etc but on the days I feel happy its great, I get the house cleaned faster because I’m not distracted by notifications.

So I decided to put the phone down all together, buckled down with the cleaning, greeted the kids as they came home from school, gutted out my work desks ready for when I start crafting again, hosed the kids down and felt a load better then earlier.

So, to round it all up,

Do I miss Facebook? Yes.

Do I feel better about not having it? Getting there.

Do I feel better that I’m more motivated when my face is not glued to the screen? Yes.

So a week is done now, 3 more to go but I need a new target, something to plod on through the week instead of making every day a boring blog about the same thing, I doubt anyone will read this but your more than welcome to put forward a suggestion, anything to focus doing next week that will keep me distracted from social networks.

Gluing your phone to your face!

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

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Today was a day to do the shopping.

*Insert childish groan here*.

Todays routine:

1) Get up,
2) Walk across the landing half naked because not wanting to pee myself took priority over putting on a bra (logical thinking would have been to take the bra with me but no one is that smart after just waking up),
3) Get kids up,
4) Cram their faces with cereal,
remembering which uniform goes on what child,
5) Get them dressed,
6) Turn around youngests jumper because I put it on backwards,
7) Ship both older ones off,
8) Drag both younger one to pre school,
9) Skip home merrily,
10) Drag husband out of bed and
11) Get on the bus.

Sitting on the bus, trying to stay occupied due to deactivating facebook 6 days ago (at least I’m not counting the minutes and hours now), I look around at my fellow bus adventurers, husbamd has his face in the newspaper, two old ladies are chatting and the other half a dozen have their faces lit up…. hold on….lit up?

As they shuffled around I finally noticed this wasn’t some kind of virus, they just had their faces in their phones, thumbs going ten to the dozen, pausing to briefly snort a little puff of comical air from their nostrils and carry on, one person waiting at a stop along the way didn’t even realise the bus had pulled up beside him because he was glued to his phone.

Beeps and buzzes is all I hear for the rest of the journey, and occasionally the 2 old ladies chatting about funerals and the smell of hospitals.

Arriving at town, the scene was no better, mothers pushing screaming children in pushchairs and almost running people’s feet over because they weren’t looking where they were going or where too busy in their phone to console their child, one man attempting to blindly reach a bin a few times before he finally looked and placed his rubbish in, quite a few relying on their sense of direction as they troddled off down the street, shop staff not realising customers had come in because something on their phone kept them intrigued, people slowing down to increase concentration etc.

Have we developed a sixth sense to help us travel in the right direction whilst preoccupied?

People have stopped walking into doors and lamp posts like they used to when they constantly texted one another.

People used to go to town and meet up with each other to vocally talk face to face, its happening less and less because they know everything that goes on in their lives due to social networking so there is nothing to discuss. Before, if I wanted to find out what a friend did, I’d browse their profile, take the easy way round it, now, I’ve hardly spoke to anyone, because I’m building up events and topics to talk about when I contact them or see them.

I had enough of stepping out of the way and dodging the zombie like phone people so left and went home.

Ended up watching funny cat and dog videos with the family… Internet winner!

Now to fry my brain with a bit of Metal Gear!

Losing a day to Sims 4

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

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I’m writing this blog from my phone so I apologise for any spelling and grammar, also watching Pokèmon, teaching the younger ones.

By the time I had put down my laptop from playing Sims 4 my eyes felt like they were BURNING! So I didn’t have he energy to blog last night, so… you get 2 from me today.

So yesterday was pretty uneventful, except waking up after a welcomed lie in to find my husband had bought and installed The Sims 4!

I thought it would only be fitting to test to see if the graphics worked and to see if there was any bugs in it, you know, so I can make sure I play it…

So I set up a female character, short red mohalk hair, full of tattoos (ish), kind of a rock chick type character, bookworm, geek and musical and set an easy aspiration (soul mate). The graphics, even turned down to low on the laptop it looked great, I liked most fine tuning all the facial features by hand though the extra fine detail options so your Sim is more unique, even down to the way they walk! Now to the hardest part of the game… choosing a name…

After what seemed to take most of the morning, Elizabeth Rouge was created.

I started of in a pre build house in a little neighbourhood to get used to how it worked and to get used to the controls. One thing i noticed was the town was smaller, less houses and sectioned out in neighbourhood’s, you can freely walk around your neighbourhood butbif you want to knock on on someone’s door, you have to “travel/visit” and await a loading screen. If you want to travel to a different neighbourhood, again, you had to travel and await a loading screen, unlike the previous Sim game where you could basically walk from your house to the main town.

First thing I did was get her to read and learn a geek skill in gaming. There are a lot more skills to learn in this one. Emotions are cleary seen on the Sims face which is a bonus and the use of extra emoions can help, you can take a “thoughtful shower” to inspire your Sim, when your Sim is inspired, they can create better art work, when confident, can improve your comedy skill and cheer up others quicker etc.

After getting to know everything in my small house I took off to find interaction, found a small community garden, stole various ingredients from it and ended up chatting with someone, the one on one conversation turned into a four way group conversation which is a new feature, my Sim got very friendly with one woman who constantly called my mobile to see if I was in, ended up having a relationship with her and she moved in, quickly got bored of her hot headed temper and laziness and broke it off…. she was indeed a woman scorned…

After that I decided to move to the other town (by the way, I soon found out that both towns mingle with each other and started seeing her around the town center), but decided to motherlode this bad boy! The building features take a while to get used to but make the building experience a lot easier, disappointed with the roof abilities as you can’t set the roof height so had to opt for a flat tiled roof. If you want to move a room its simple enough, just click it and move the whole lot, simple!

My eyes were drained after a day with The Sims so I snuggled under the duvet and watched Sin City, picked up my phone to write an epic status about Sims 4….. dag nabbit! Habbits die hard!

Seeking Distraction

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

The other day I mentioned in my blog that I bought a 60 gig PS3, I was so happy, it meant I didn’t have to keep switching cables to play previous PlayStation console games….. guess what……. It turned out to be faulty *insert excessive crying emotion here*. It kept overheating, and switched itself off during game play and the fans were screeching on full power. Yes it is a problem that could maybe be fixed, but we didn’t know anyone local enough to do so, after forking out the money for it in the first place, we didn’t want to spend much more on it and its known that if they break once, they are bound to break again in the near future. After packing it away in the bag Saturday evening we thought “oh hold on, we’ll need the receipt”…. You can guess what happened here! After spending a good few hours hunting high and low for this crucial piece of paper, under every rock, in every forbidden crevice, we called it a night. Sunday… We cleaned up the mess we had made the previous night and carried on our search…. even gutted out the bedroom whilst moving everything around….. nothing. We noticed there was a bar code on the underside of the PS3, we hoped this was enough to at least exchange it for another one of equal value. This morning (Monday) we got the kids up and dressed, eldest walked off to school, then the second eldest, we had agreed to go straight into town when the 2 younger ones were dropped off at Pre-School, got their coats on, picked up lunch boxes and the bag containing the PS3, just about to walk out the door then notice a piece of paper on the bookshelf…… IT WAS THE RECEIPT! We had checked the bookcase over and over, even pulled it out to have a look behind and underneath so no idea how it ended up there, without question it too much and breathing a sigh of relief, we headed out the door, dropped the kids off and headed into town.

Got there, exchanged it for a 120 gig PS3, popped back home, set it all up, updated and signed in again, went to play a game…. and it wouldn’t read disks…..DAG NABBIT!

Picked up the kids from pre-school and headed back into town, exchanged it for another, spent far too much round town because the little magpies we call our children spotted cake… They are cake mad! Came back home, set it all back up again, updated and signed in again and breathed a sigh of relief again as it was working perfectly, as it should.

P.S. If any gamers are reading my blog, please feel free to add me on PSN or XBox360 – CwootieCreature 😉

Finished the day the usual way, nothing special, got the kids to bed, sat down, started the blog, at least I’ve had enough to do to keep my mind occupied, now sat here thinking what else to do, something interesting to write about…. *twiddles thumbs*…. *picks up phone to check Facebook*……..oh dag nabbit!

Am I attention seeking? Am I Seeking Attention!!! Look at me! Read me! PAY ATTENTION TO ME OR I WILL DESTROY MY BLOG!

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

Soooooooo sorry I forgot to blog yesterday…. Assassins Creed: Brotherhood, says it all really….

Facebook seemed to be everywhere today, like an unrelenting force trying to pull me in! Sundays are so laid back, all we usually do is watch TV most of the day, Cartoon Network over powers the screen and after 5 minutes of it being on you find yourself giggling at something extremely stupid and unrelated to the topic that’s just been mentioned. CBeeBies is another channel that seems to be the focus of the screen, the bright shiny colours and catchy tunes make you want to bash your brains out, yet, hypnotises you, makes you feel happy about yourself till “moments” later you realise you’ve been watching it for a hour and you’ve been left on your own to do so whilst the kids are building a fort upstairs…. cheers kids!

So, being bored out of my skull and with the kids occupied and me needing to keep my mind of Facebook, I looked round my room and realised my work desk was too far from the bed, its sooooo far away from my bed…. well… maybe a few feet but I had it in my head I wanted it closer so that after an evening of crafting I could just literally roll into bed! 

Well…… that killed 2 hours, between acting out scenes from The Chuckle Brothers (“To me, to you.”) and a classic Laurel and Hardy sketch between me and the husband, my desk was in its designated spot!

The husband was back and forth on his Facebook account, messaging a million people and commenting on anything he saw, an event had kicked off on a group we were both part of the admin team for. I almost….ALMOST activated my profile again to console, nose and laugh at parts of what was happening, but a niggling feeling in my brain reminded me I’m not supposed to be on, almost like a slap round the head, so I backed away from the phone, huffing and puffing because they have been told to wait.

I only have contact details for a few of them from the group, I had posted my details on a few occasions and told them I was going but only a couple of people replied…. Which got me thinking….

The many posts I made with great information, awesome facts and serious news never really seemed to go noticed yet if I posted about having a poopie, posted a funny meme or arguing with someone, everyone got involved, especially when there was drama involved, so many people wanted to have a gossip about drama, real life people they knew not serious world problems, because its human nature to be curious, and some wanted gossip to have an excuse to laugh about your situation.

But people often did….. 

Before I deactivated my profile I had come to the conclusion that ANYONE who uses a social media site or ANYTHING that can be seen by someone is seeking some kind of recognition…. seeking attention! Think about it, if we didn’t want anyone to see it, we would write in a diary, but if we wanted to write something, to seek approval, we post it online…. 

Obviously, like all aspects of life, there are many forms of “Attention Seeking”, for example :-

Mild – Those who use unfamiliar sites to themselves, such as myself using Word Press, this is my first ever blog, I use it once a day (unless I miss a day, then my followers have a double whammy of my rants) but have told no one I’m writing it, I’ve been so used to someone seeing what I write and its a place to show progress, those who have a few friends and speak to them about normal things and situations and those who barely use any social media sites. “Enjoying the attention of others is socially acceptable in some situations” – Wikipedia quote, so its normal, right? To want to be noticed by someone?

Normal – Those who tend to use social media sites often-ish, ranging from a couple of times a day, posting once or twice to a few times and spending a good hour on the sites, speak to friends on a daily basis, post a photo now and again, occasionally tell people what they are up to or accumulate all their thoughts at the end of the day in a post.

Bad – Is on a social media site most of the day, posting something more then a few times in the day, speaking about personal life but not giving out any real answers as to what has happened or giving hints, having your phone vibrating every 5 minutes due to notifications.

EXCESSIVE! – Posting about EVERYTHING you do, spending all day with your face in your phone/computer, stopping real life situations because you received a notifications, fabricating something that has happened to make it sound much better/worse then it actually was, creating negativity and unnecessary drama everywhere possible, posting 10,000 selfies (not the actual number but you get my drift) and saying “I’m ugly” whilst posing half nude or flexing to get an ego boost…. you know what, I’ll just let this Urban Dictionary definition do the rest of it, please be warned, that link can offend some as it contains offensive words and definitions.

Lets face it, we all know someone in the excessive category, so we all know what to look out for, unfortunately, its these types of people who tend to stir negative emotions in ourselves whether its actively directed at us or not, and their tends to be a lot of people like this, seeing negative things makes us depressed, if not a lot, then a little, imagine one depressing post after another, it will slowly wear you down more and more. For instance, Robin Williams, when he passed away my news feed was flooded with “R.I.P’s” and pictures, for those that adored him as much as I, this was depressing, all I wanted to do was watch films he starred in and cry into a pillow for days, every time I saw something, for those of you who despised him, I bet it made you angry that your news feed was filled with all of this? Exactly my point, if you see something you deem negative, it will eventually turn you temporary negative, the power of suggestion in a way. Imagine if all you saw was things that made you happy….. you, in turn, will feel a whole lot better in yourself, unfortunately the world doesn’t work like this.

Pretty much most of us crave attention in some way at some point so we rush to social media sites to fulfil our desires.

So try this…. Turn your mobile phone and computer off, put it down and go see someone, I shall leave you with this article I found to help you see why you should spend less time on Facebook, its eventually working for me.

Reasons to delete your Facebook App

The ability to change your Destiny?

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

“You’ve been granted the power to predict the future! The catch — each time you use your power, it costs you one day (as in, you’ll live one day less). How would you use this power, if at all?”

 

I know this isn’t a usual blog from me but I couldn’t resist.

A recent question asked by The Daily Post titled Advantage of Foresight got me thinking… (And yes, for those who are wondering, it did hurt!)

Having 4 children, I only want the best for them, like any parent would, would I want to predict their future to see if they have taken a good path in life or a bad one so I can help change it?

A simple answer…. Yes, in a heart beat!

Next question, how far into the future would I want to predict? I am a firm believer in experiencing the bad things in life and learning from your mistakes and I know if I saw something bad, a mother’s instinct would immediately kick in and I’d want to divert them from making a mistake.

I know curiosity would get the better of me and I would immediately look into all 4 of my children’s futures, about the age when each of them would be 18, to see how my current parenting skills have been moulding them into adults and to see what paths they are choosing for themselves – 4 days gone…

If all goes well and they are still in contact with me by then, I would sit them all down when they are 18 and ask them how far into their futures they would want to know – Another 4 days gone…

Part of me would want to be able to predict my own death, out of curiosity, to see how long I had left and how I died, but if I did this first my prediction would be off by 4 days due to having 1 day taken away for each of the children’s predictions then again when they are 18, and if I’m having to change anything in the immediate predictions, my own predictions about my death could be changed, the whole “Butterfly Effect” thing. Curiosity would always get the better of me anyway, I am weak like that, so I would check twice, once after each lot after the children’s predictions, just to make sure I’m still around… but even then the prediction would be compromised as you wouldn’t know if the day that’s taken off you is exchanged before or after your prediction is made… confusing, isn’t it? So what would be the point? If you predicted you were ran over by a car, making the initial prediction would make you die the day before the car accident… so it wouldn’t happen so you’d die of something else…

And, of course, I’d want to see if my marriage lasts through the golden years or wither away.

If someone falls ill, I’d want to make sure they pulled thought, another day gone.

You start talking to a new friend, you might want to see if that friendship will last – Another day gone!

But if you saw the friendship wouldn’t last, you might want to break it off there and then and miss out on opportunities, memories and life lessons.

If you saw anything bad, would you want to change it and cause a Butterfly Effect?

Would their be any point in any prediction?

Would we actually be able to change anything?

Question is… can you truly say you wouldn’t let curiosity get the better of you? Curiosity did kill the cat after all…. 

48 hours later….

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

I survived 48 hours without Facebook!!! Achievement unlocked!!!

Admittedly it has been a little hard today. Woke up, picked up phone to check…. DAG NABBIT!

Spent the rest of the morning grumpy but at least I didn’t have any mad rush to sort out the school run, so I proceeded to drag my feet around the house, left the husband in bed because I knew I’d take my PFS (Post Facebook Syndrome) out on him and dove right into cleaning.

After cleaning, sat down, picked up the mobile….no Facebook… DAG NABBIT!

I was surprised at the amount of applications that required a Facebook log in as I sought to fill the empty void, here is just a few…

Hay Day – Another annoying game app that refused me access unless I signed in.

Spotify – Because I had joined up with my account I couldn’t access it. Luckily I managed to change the settings and was able to screech along to my playlist.

Pinterest – Again, signed up with my account, it was a bit more difficult but managed to change details.

At this point I had given up with the apps I had and downloaded new games, Like Injustice and some paper folding game, just to fill the 5 minute gaps I get of peace and quiet whilst sat in the… “office”.

Woke the husband up at 11am, by this time I was calm enough to do so, after 10 minutes of doing his impression of a Zombie rising from the grave and realising that the pillow he was chewing on was not in fact a man’s arm, he checked his own Facebook. I sat with him whilst he spoke to some mutual friends, was read out a couple of mutual friends statuses and BAM! Instant headache!!! Stress headache followed by de-motivation, it was like the screen was draining me of my life force. I managed to pull myself away but it took a while to “recover”, I felt quite low for a while but had enough going on in the house to keep me occupied.

Flitting back and forth to my emails, I felt quite lonely, I was used to being able to get my hourly fix of social interaction and now it was gone. Its like watching a train wreck, then being told there was another wreck round the corner but being denied access but wanting to compare the difference between the two, curiosity can be quite an angry emotion.

My social interaction was satisfied by speaking to a friend who rang and a visit from a neighbour and felt a little better knowing that it was a one on one/face to face conversation instead of feeling like I was standing on a podium with a megaphone screeching out what I was up to with only a few people listening and the minority judging.

The afternoon bought along a different kind of interaction… from an 8 legged creature, a Wolf Spider to be exact. The little ones screamed and instantly jumped up on the sofa whilst I placed a cup over the mutated monster and found a glass jar for it. The younger ones absolutely love creepy crawlies, as long as they are in a jar. As my almost 3 year old studied it with great detail, I took a photo, clicked “upload” – “PLEASE LOG INTO FACEBOOK”…. DAG NABBIT! 

Home made lasagne for dinner, very proud of my creation, took a photo, clicked “upload”…. BLOODY DAG NABBIT!

Had a couple of emails from friends today confirming I had the right details for them, was too emotionally traumatised and drained by the time it came to reply.

I had realised their was a few pages I forgot to get emails/web pages for a few companies I wanted to keep in touch with and it made me realise how much Facebook made life….Lazier! Easier! “Dont forget to like our page to keep up to date”, “Find us on Facebook for the best deals” and “Want to see our new products, find us on Facebook” was all I saw on passing vans, commercials and even general internet ads, its so much easier to remember a name then it is a web address or phone number, and I know a lot of people nowadays do not like talking over the phones, texting and instant messaging has spoilt us in that way and boosted our anxieties of one on one communication to save possible rejection and negativity. I for one don’t like speaking on the phone, I’m the Queen of Awkward Silences, usually my husband does the talking for the both of us, deals with phone calls and answering the door so I have drifted in that downward spiral myself, another reason why I felt the need to come off Facebook, to gain confidence.

All in all, I’m proud I beat my first goal of staying off my profile for 48 hours…. which reminds me… I will set up a page soon listing all goals I hope to achieve from this self experiment and what I want to push myself to do.

Right, I think that’s it…. back to twiddling my thumbs…

The first full day….

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

Wake up to the most annoying sound in the world…… the beeping alarm!

First thing I did….. went to check Facebook! DAG NABBIT!

Just like waking up to a strange, dribbling, unfamiliar face, I realising what I had done and felt aweful, Asking all the “what if…?”‘s and wondering what the world was up to, I slithered out of bed to begin my day.

With not having to waste my first half an hour of the day glued to the gossip of the grapevine I was able to wake the children up, sort packed lunches, dress them appropriately (this is usually a chore in itself with getting mixed up with all the uniforms), an start the first school run of the morning.

Walking with my eldest, who had just started High School, I was able to have a normal conversation with her. Usually I’d be still annoyed about a post someone had made on Facebook that morning and kept quiet, or had not woken up properly but I had noticed how already, I was unusually calm. Part of her school walk involves a footpath surrounded by a small field and a few trees and shrubs dotted, as we walked through we were both able to notice leaves falling around us and how it felt like Autumn is slowly creeping up on us. As she is still getting used to the long walk and memorising it, we were leaving/meeting her further and further from her school. She asked if she could walk by herself or with friends as of next week and that was the point it dawned on me, she was growing up quicker than I could keep up, and half of it I was missing due to constant notifications of (usually) someone’s opinion I couldn’t care less about (but felt the need to acknowledge). The featured picture was made via an app called “Ku” in honour of my eldest daughter.

So getting back home and packing the rest of the children at their schools I realised I needed to keep occupied. Dragging the husband from his pit, we headed to town.

The bus ride is always boring so I pull my phone out of my pocket for some more Farm Hero Saga……”LOG INTO FACEBOOK”… DAG NABBIT!

I pull my phone out whilst sat in Costa, checking the time and went looking for the Facebook app button, realising I had deleted it to help avoid temptations……DAG NABBIT AGAIN!

So, needing to keep my mind occupied, and with my birthday coming up, I was treated to a PS3 60 gig. I sold my beloved 60 gig last year to pay for my phone bill so I can keep in touch with people via texting and on Facebook, realising how stupid now that had been. I love my gaming, new and retro and it broke my heart to have to sell it. Carefully carrying it back home all I wanted to do was sequel and skip down the path with glee! Got home, set it up, took a picture and upload to Faceb…… DAG NABBIT!

After schools had finished and the children were running around the house I slumped into the chair. I had various random conversations that made no sense with our almost 3 year old, sat and listened to our almost 4 year old repeating that her birthday is soon and watched our 8 and 11 year old fight like cat and dog but being so witty and quick tongued with the very mild insults I had realised that I had missed a lot of the little bits these children did, all it takes is a few seconds to create awesome memories.

After day one I have discovered already I am a lot more chilled out then normal, I must have gone to check my Facebook over 20 times to be highly disappointed though but mainly, I’m wondering if people had noticed I had gone, and if they had, what were they saying?

I emailed the few contacts that inboxed me before I had left, checking I wrote down the right emails, adding a few to my contacts list, by constantly checking my Hotmail for social interaction I think I may have worn down my F5 key….

That’s the point in time I thought “maybe I should blog about this?”, make a few goals etc, so, here we are….

Deactivation Day 4/9/14 @ 22.14

Posted on by aftermathofdeactivation

After putting numerous posts asking for peoples contact details such as Skype, Email, phone numbers etc I didn’t get very many… the joys of how Facebook is laid out (Le Sigh).

So, at 22.14 I decided I wasn’t waiting any longer…. goodbye cruel world, woe is me, blah blah blah….bye.

I sat contemplating how long it would take me to re-activate my profile…. I gave myself 48 hours…. How bad is that?

I had spotted a bar of Oreo Dairy Milk. “oh a couple of pieces wont hurt”, famous last words….

After wondering if anyone had noticed I had gone, I reached blindly for another piece of chocolate, only to be faced with an empty wrapper. DANG NABBIT! Whole bar…. eaten…. I cried inside, just a little, it was way to tasty to dwell on it too long.

I sat on my phone clearing various unused phone apps I never or no longer played, cleared a few blurry photos that I attempted to take of my children running around like they had consumed far to many E-numbers, crawled into bed and decided it was too early to sleep, in my eyes, its always too early to sleep. I didn’t have the mental capacity to craft anything so I sat again with my phone and loaded up Farm Hero Saga, to be faced with “LOG IN TO FACEBOOK!”, I cried a little again as I realised I could not beg for extra lives and drag people down with me into the epically annoying world of meaningless apps.

I still needed some form of profile due to having a business like page but I made a back up profile with no friends on it, just so I can continue to engage with the little over 1,500 fans I had and continue to promote my business but it’ll only be used for that sole purpose, I will happily give people the profile link to check up that I am only using it for that purpose and not to engage in anything else.

I became Admin of a few groups, one called Banter Trader, I made friends with a load of them, made enemies, but that’s what having an opinion can bring, but it was just that… banter… nothing was to be taken seriously but it was somewhere to vent and “affectionately insult” each other. Another was Always Gaming, a small game group set up to sell, buy and discuss anything game related, became good friends with the other Admin and even had late night chats with one of them. T.G.G (Tamworth Gaming Group) is my brothers gaming group, more like a local community in our home town to discuss games and get to know each other. Lastly, Alternative Creativity! People showing off hand made alternative items, the group creator is a very good friend of mine and we both made alternative products and loved looking at others work. I will miss the group discussions but advise you go take a look.

I am a mother of 4 with a failing at home business, socially anxious and like video games, what could have possibly gone wrong? With my face stuck in my phone half the time I felt, as with the reasons stated in the other blog page, I was neglecting life.

So I decided to do this self social experiment to see if at least one month could change my outlook, improve emotions and productivity. It felt like I was loosing an arm, It was an addiction, being able to watch peoples lives from the comfort of my own home. The decision came after I had read a few articles explaining how Facebook can cause trust issues, obsessive compulsive desires and behaviours, and all types of mental instabilities and illnesses such as depression and anxiety.

My husband is still active on his profile and I don’t want him to change that, I want him to carry on, to make up his own mind about it.

I do however, have twitter, I am no where near as active on that and that’s how it will stay, I believe its no where near as personal as Facebook is.

I want to be able to remember things, such as Birthdays, by myself, speaking of Birthdays…. I’ve just remembered I’m not going to get inundated with birthday messages on my wall this month, it will be interesting to see how many people remember…..