Participate in TV Turnoff Week 2008

I guess it is good to have the willpower to do it. But overall, I am not sure it’s worth it for me personally. I’ll do it to support my son, though.

In the past week, if it weren’t TV turnoff week, I might’ve watched TV on DVD once or twice with my husband, when we got enough other things done not to feel guilty about that. And that’s it for TV.

Otherwise, I was giving up “recreational computing.” And that means I gave up 43T.

But having done so, I’m not entirely convinced it was worth it. First of all, it was giving up a segment of my social life. Maybe that’s sad, but I do have real life people I keep up with too, so it’s not entirely pathetic. And I care about people here, and I missed them, and I wondered what was happening with them. Second, without being able to “debrief” here and report on accomplishments and be cheered on regularly, I got quite slothful. Yes, I read more each night—90 minutes instead of 20 minutes, probably. But otherwise, I didn’t get done the things I thought I would. I didn’t even do all of my regular things, like exercising! So I think being disconnected from this online community was actually bad for me.

This year, it was much harder for me to stay away than last year. That might be bad, or might not. But having the willpower to do so, and not interrupting myself during work hours to check 43T, and being supportive of my son all make me say “worth it.” Otherwise, I’d actually say it wasn’t.

And now I’m looking forward to catching up!

i sucked at this. Could not resist the first new Grey’s Anatomy in Ages and Ages.

hanging my head, oh yes i am.

but will make up for this soon.

somehow.

I goofed and totally ignored this goal this week. Starting tomorrow, I am observing “Orthodox TV Turnoff Week”.

Hopefully this is not offensive to any Orthodox Christians out there.

I’ve gotten conflicting info on the dates for this.

And maybe I am just being stupid, but I find the website to be very unhelpful. Seems like the first page should list this year’s dates. And that all the supposed links there should be, oh, I don’t know, clickable? I do a lot of successful online research, so I don’t think it’s me. Shrug.

Anyway, my son’s school is doing TV turnoff week next week, not this week, so I’ll be participating next week.

to support my son. And I’ll do it again. His school gets the kids to participate, and they do a few alternate activities, like a book swap.

It includes all recreational screen time—internet, videogames, etc. which makes it more important this year, because he’s obsessed with Lego Star Wars on the Wii. He bugs me all the time for permission to play it. We barely ever watch TV, so last year’s turnoff week was no big deal, but his love of videogames has developed since then.

...I did this. I’ve been meaning to curtail my watching for awhile now (it’s tough given the fact that new, free, legal streaming TV services seem to be popping up left and right). This seems like the perfect time to start working on it.

The 21st through the 27th. I’m ready!