No-Technology Week Ends Early

On Sunday night at midnight, the family and I decided to give up “entertainment technology” for a full week. The fact that you are reading this on Thursday should clue you in that we failed. Here’s how things went down.

Moments after agreeing as a family that we would give up electronic entertainment for a week, the bargaining began. Susan’s two caveats were that she would still need to use her cell phone for work, and she wanted to be able to listen to her iPod while exercising. Mason pleaded his case for taking his iPod and/or Nintendo DS to daycare, but to no avail. Morgan didn’t seem to care one way or the other … yet. And I was willing to agree to almost anything because if I needed to check my e-mail I could do so during my breaks at work and I figured I could live without most of my gadgets and the Internet for a few days.

Twice on Monday I learned the hard way what Susan and I use our cell phones for — coordination. Susan and I carpool to work, but often she drops me off at my building which means I don’t always know where the car is parked. Monday during lunch Susan ended up attending a meeting, but told me where the car was (supposedly) parked and that I should go to lunch by myself. After wandering around the parking lot for 10 minutes, I said screw it and pulled out my cell phone to call and find out where the car was. Susan didn’t answer. After 20 minutes, I gave up and just walked to the cafeteria to grab something to eat. (Turns out, she told me the wrong parking lot!) After work we had similar problems. Susan was running late and tried to call me to let me know, but since I “didn’t have a phone”, I ignored her calls. She did eventually show up, 25 minutes later than usual.

On Monday I also discovered it’s pretty difficult to “pretend” you don’t have a cell phone, especially when it’s an iPhone with Internet access. I honestly didn’t realize how many times a day I use my phone to text people, check e-mail, or check the time.

By the time we got home Monday night, the kids were having major withdrawals. On the way home, probably due to the lack of noise, the kids decided to make their own, making up multiple annoying songs. At one point they chanted in unison “Always flush the potty!” over and over again for no apparent reason. When we got home, with no television or computer, the kids drug out every toy they owned that made noise and made noise with them. After a few hours they gave up. Morgan and Susan worked on a jigsaw puzzle. I began reading a book I’ve been meaning to start reading for about a year. Mason went to bed early, pissed at us all.

On Tuesday, I complained to Susan that I wasn’t able to fulfill all my “online obligations” — which, if you think of it, is kind of silly. Things like checking on my forum, or working on my podcast, or updating Twitter and Facebook … things I feel obligated to do, things I feel as though people would be let down if I did not do them. Weird reality check, that.

And it just so happened that one of those weird obligation things popped up. On Tuesday I was contacted by a reporter from the Tulsa World, who wanted to interview me about my Weird Al UHF Page (Weird Al is coming to Tulsa soon). I got the e-mail via my phone and we did the interview via cell phone that afternoon during my break. So pretty much by Tuesday afternoon I had already broken all the “no-technology” rules. But this was important. That was one of the running themes of the week. Everybody was willing to give up their technology, unless it was something “important”. And something “important” meant, “they wanted to use it right then for something.” It would be interesting someday to take all the cell phones, all the iPods, all the TV remotes, all the everythings and lock them up somewhere for a week. I wonder who would kill me first …

Tuesday night went smooth, but only because we had dinner plans with some of Susan’s co-workers which meant we didn’t get home from work until about an hour before the kids’ bedtime. Anybody can entertain themselves for an hour. We decided to let Morgan listen to the radio (it was “important”) and Mason got to watch television as long as he was walking on the treadmill.

Now, one thing I do a LOT on the Internet is read news sites. I have around 40-50 websites I check routinely thanks to RSS feeds. I didn’t check any of them over the past 3 days, and by day 3 the desire to check them kind of waned, too. Suddenly, knowing which celebrity got a DUI or reading about a computer game that won’t be out for six months doesn’t seem as important as it did last week. One of my to do lists is to weed out those feeds, pronto. Gizmodo, Kotaku and Slashdot are all telling me I missed 600+ posts per site in 3 days. I’m not Number 5; I need less input.

One part of the last three days that Susan and I have both enjoyed is the change in our morning routine. Before this week, Mason would wake up and get on his computer, I would get on mine, and Morgan would plant herself in front of SpongeBob. It’s no wonder we were always rushing to make it to work on time! Over the past three days with all those things turned off, we’ve had more than enough time to get to work on time (early, even!) and even spent some time (gasp) talking in the car. That’s something we hope to continue from here on out.

I was right about one thing — moderation is key. There’s nothing wrong with playing some video games or making a few phone calls, but when that’s all you do, that’s all you are. This evening we’re going to ease some of our old “things” back into our life, but in moderation; maybe an hour of TV or computer gaming time each night instead of three hours, for example.

Oh, and I finished the book I started. 300 pages in 2 1/2 days. Felt good.