Category Archive

social media

Social Media Diet: Recognizing Instagram as a rat lever

I committed Facebook social suicide last year, and now I’ve decided to officially make the switch from Instagram back to Flickr. I have very strong feels about Flickr, and have a sense of needing to give it one last chance. And if I’m going to abandon it, it’s NOT going to be for Instagram. I’m also embarrassed at how shitty my photography has gotten over the six months I’ve been using Instagram. I’m also trying to recognize and remove the “rat levers” in my digital life…

Social Media Diet: How I committed Facebook social suicide

A reader caught wind of the fact that I socially bailed on Facebook in 2011, and asked me to share the story. Conveniently, I documented the process on my personal blog. I’ll be sharing the three posts this week, as part of a series called Social Media Diet.

Life after ditching my smart phone

We were just like any other couple with smart phones: checked in on Facebook or Foursquare, had work emails set up so we looked at them way too often, shared funny photos and spent part of work surfing the internet. Then it all changed. We ditched our smart phones and have lived to tell the tale.

What I learned from overcoming my addiction to Facebook

November of 2007 is when I first opened a Facebook account, and I was hooked on social networking. Then, when I was engaged, things got weird. — virtual harassment bled into real life creepiness. After that I started wondering how much I actually needed Facebook. So I deleted all my online accounts and learned a lot in the process.

3 age-appropriate ways to talk to kids and teens about media portrayals of sexual assault

I have this super awesome talent for thinking of the perfect thing to say hours later. A talent which is not in any way useful — unless you have a blog. In which case you can blog about it and get it all out. So here are three possible, age-appropriate, conversations you can have with your children about rape that I came up with.

Your OMGI’MPREGNANT stories: the feelings that come with peeing on a stick

In keeping with our day’s theme, I asked our Facebook friends how they reacted when they peed on a stick and found out they were pregnant! Three hours later, there were over 75 reponses… here are a few that had to be shared.

We need to quit telling lies on Facebook

Not to be outdone, I uploaded our new pictures. “Sunny Saturday!” I wrote in the status. I’m not a total liar. I’m just good at PR. Time passed — five minutes? An hour? When you’re blissfully ignoring your kids, the seconds slip by far too quickly.

If you’re struggling to conceive, talking to friends in the same boat may help you cope

I wrote about our struggle on my blog, and the reception was incredible. People shared that they’d been trying, personal struggles of their own, that they’d be thinking of me. No one gave me well-meaning but awful advice. Some people who now have tiny children shared that it took them years of trying to get to that point and they sympathised with my struggle. All up, it has been a positive experience and I’m glad I put myself out there.