A part of me looks forward to this Media Deprivation experience, mainly because it allows me to focus on the important tasks at hand (grading, daily chores at the house, projects I've put off, et al.), but also because it lets me clear my head from all the "noise" mass media produces for me on a daily basis.
But the other part REALLY loathes this Media Deprivation experience because like many of you I, too, listen to music constantly throughout the day, and when I'm not doing that I'm constantly watching either a movie or something sports-related on the TV.
So, despite this being my third Media Deprivation, I'm still not used to stripping away all these forms of mass media. What I've also discovered is that depriving myself of music, movies, web-surfing, gaming, social networking makes me lazy. Yep, even your professor is susceptible to sleeping in or loafing about to cope with this tortuous experiment.
Thankfully, my Friday was rather easy to navigate. After waking up and resisting the temptation to check my Twitter feed (which I sometimes do while still in bed!), I got a lot of grading done but without the distracting sounds of my iTunes library playing in the background. In fact, the only "sounds" I listened to while grading were the various noises emanating from the washer and dryer. Yeah, this day seemed like a good day to wash clothes.
I had to run some errands later in the day so I was dreading not being able to listen to my car stereo while on the road. If I'm not listening to CDs I'm listening to talk radio while driving, all of which allow me to kind of zone out and ignore the outside world. But I think there's a benefit to not listening to any type of music or talk show while in the car; well, other than being able to notice your car making a weird noise in time to take it in for a check-up. Anyway, the benefit for me is that the silence allows me to really think about things and clear out whatever "junk" may be floating in my head at the time.
I spent the rest of my day eating out with some friends at TGIFriday's (BTW, almost all of their appetizers are half off right now!). Got to see the Lakers-Miami game while sitting by the bar, which means I got to see Kobe Bryant sink the game-winning three-pointer at the buzzer... *sigh*... Yeah, I HATE the Lakers! So being at a social environment such as a restaurant, and with friends, I was able to indulge in some mass media consumption.
I finished off the night at a house-warming party, which provided some much needed warmth since the temperature dropped to 24 degrees! Man, it was cold last night. After some socializing--and watching strangers play drinking games and dance themselves silly (I only knew a few people there)--I called it a night and read myself to sleep.
One day down, two more to go....
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I do have to say not having music has been the hardest part of this whole project. Like, my son takes up 102% of my day so I don't have too much to actually be online or texting or even watching shows I want, but my workout time or driving time was the one time I could escape "elmo's world" and go into my own. Needless to say, I totally feel you on the music thing, and this project has urged me to pick up my old Calvin and Hobbes collection books and give them another read through. I forgot how enlightening Bill Watterson is...
ReplyDeleteTo respond to your comment on the whole sports thing. That has been the only thing forcing me out of my house besides work. I totally feel you on the loophole of socializing because of sports. I am a huge sprts fan myself. I have been going to sports bars and friends' to catch up on my sports. But man I was upset after that Spurs game.
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