Anti-social?

This is not one blog post. This is the result of more than 25 revisions of a blog post that I started writing over a month ago. I just – can’t – post what I originally started writing, because at this stage I’m bored to tears by my own sentences. I generally have more drafts here than published items. It’s a vicious circle; every time I find something new to write about, I tell myself I have to finish one I’m already working on first, and I can’t finish one I’m working on because, because… Anyway, as anyone can see from my infrequent additions, this means that nothing has been published at all for almost two months.

This blog post started out (actually, the only resemblance to the original is the title) as a rant on your everyday, typical Facebook posts, written in a huff after a very bad day. It was one of those days where nothing works out, everybody is stupid, road-rage takes you over, you shout at your family and do not relent until doors are slamming or someone (most likely yourself) is crying. I was about to take it out on the world but decided against it, and after a few days it developed into a reflection on self-censorship online. Reflection soon became action however, and here I am again with a half-written post, unable to finish and just press “enter”.

At some stage in this process I came across the article 7 Ways to Be Insufferable on Facebook, and I think this might be what my enterphobia boils down to. The author of the article claims that most insufferable fb-posts are motivated by image crafting, narcissism, attention craving, wanting to induce jealousy or loneliness (in other words, great qualities that you want to expose to the world, right?). To a certain degree, I agree that people should reconsider before they inform 300 people + that they are off to bed, but I’m finding it hard to identify any post in social media that can’t be boiled down to one of the qualities above. Even hilarious or inspiring ones are a form of image crafting, are they not?  And why would we publicly proclaim something if we didn’t want to receive attention?

So yes, on a bad day I might find everyone on Facebook insufferable. But always, always, I’m a lot more afraid of being insufferable to everybody else. Thus, photos remain unpublished and half-written comments and tweets are deleted. Blog posts are edited until I forget what it was I wanted to say.

Now, what was it I wanted to say? Oh yes, I say, “no more self-sencorship!” Expect to hear a lot more from me in the future, whether you like it or not!

Status update

It’s been over two weeks, but despite surprising amounts of motivation in the final week of writing and a euphoric couple of days after, I have been unable to think about *it* since. I have hardly been able read anything, nevermind write a single word!

So what have I been up to?

• Go to London to frollick with Ida, Sprock, mum and dad – √
  click here for more info
• Drink a pint or two of Czech premium beer, in a pub – √
  First stop! Safe to say the count is quite a bit higher now
• Go to the park with Matilda and bring a picnic
  On today’s agenda
• Order chicken wings AND ribs at Olympia – √
  Just ribs, but only because I was having KFC for dinner that night
• Watch the complete Gilmore Girls series
  on episode 7 of season 1
• Read all the books I got for Christmas – x
  
• Play Guitar Hero till 4 in the morning – x
  but I have watched a lot of films
• Write three blog posts in one week – hah!
• Have a lie-in and breakfast in bed
  Lie in, yes, breakfast in bed, Steve?

• Go paperless with Evernote – haha!
• Organise my iPhoto library – hahaha!
• Organise my iPhone apps – √
  did that before I finished (procrastination station)
• Fill in Matildas baby book – mohahaha!
• Clean the apartment
  one room at a time, will be done by Easter, possibly…

• Get a drivers-licence – eh...
• Move to Norway – ehm…
• Get a job – ehem...

Sprock 24, *it*, Westminster Abbey, Ida and tapas, my first homemade costume

Other than that, just trying to figure out what to do with myself now that I am not a student any more. Oh yeah, and I changed the background colour of this here blog!

A Connected Christmas

I read a lot about social media. I also spend a lot of time on it, and I discuss it with people around me. Recently, I went to lunch with my husband and two friends (one who is not even on FB) and was surprised to discover that they were very protective of their online identity, proudly announcing that they were ungoogleable. Similarly, a friend was just added on FB by someone with such a limited profile she couldn’t even work out where she lived. Contrastingly, an old friend I was virtually reacquainted with recently shares so much and so intimately I sometimes feel like we’ve spent a few hours chatting over a bottle of wine after reading her blog. I think social media is great because I never liked chatting on the phone and I prefer doing business in writing. I will also admit that I thoroughly enjoy keeping up with friends and family without it necessarily being through direct contact.

This Christmas my FB news feed has exploded with pictures of beautifully decorated trees and toddlers in holiday bliss, my own included, which is probably annoying for many. In fact, I have a FB friend who has been known to complain about new parents’ over-sharing, particularly about nappy contents, and has lately decided to get back at them by posting pics of her cats’ litter box complete with feces. Nevertheless, I relate and thus enjoy (idyllic Christmas posts, that is. I too draw the line at poo, human and animal.)

In online media, the Christmas holidays is also a time for reviewing the year that is nearing its end. The FB timeline is great for this purpose, especially if you are like me and tend to share mostly good stuff. Scrolling back through 2012, I find remarkably little about my stressful and rather lonely spring semester as a distance student. Rather, I relive a fantastic trip to Rome with my bestest friends in March, family and friends visits to Prague and an unbelievably successful end to the semester in Copenhagen that started with an oral exam and ended with birthday celebrations.

I remember a looooong, isolated summer in Norway with very little money and a very hard-working husband. Nevertheless I was able to squeeze in a trip to Læsø, two fairytale weddings and a couple of trips to Ireland. Not to mention several happy days and merry nights spent with aforementioned bestest friends and family. This autumn’s thesis hardship and preschool adjustment drama all but fade, and into focus comes Matilda’s second and Steve’s thirtieth birthday parties and the highlight of 2012 – an intimate, literary gathering in the library of one of my favourite author’s, Gert Nygårdshaug.

Tantrums, viruses and bugs, stress and despair, shouting and crying, and the fact that I haven’t slept past 8 am the whole year (which aren’t apparent on FB), are but distant memories. On FB I only see how my darling Matilda has grown into a proper little girl this year. I see the three of us at playgrounds and restaurants and lounging at home and realise how lucky we are to be able to spend so much time together.

Granted, my FB profile might not give an accurate account of me and my life in 2012, but it is definitely gives me high hopes for 2013. I therefore wish you many likes in the new year!

Lambrusco Lunch with the sisters and the Ida’s in Oslo. Cheers!

How Can I not Have a Blog When…

I really, really want to write. I always have, and I suspect I always will. It is the only creative outlet that I am even remotely, I wont say talented at, so lets go with not completely sucky at. Some people can cook, I mean really cook, without being chefs. Some people knit and crochet fantastic things, without being… whatever a professional knitter is called. Some sing or dance without being artists, and bloggers write without being writers. It’s so cool! I really wish I had realised this sooner!

I can be a pseudo-academic researcher. I am in the final phase of a very, very long era called studenthood and most likely facing a future in an office or a library or some such place. I cannot begin to express how much I am looking forward to an income and somewhat predictable hours, but most of all, not having the constant pressure of paper deadlines hanging over my head. To leave work and be free for the rest of the day. Nevertheless, it is the paper writing I am gonna miss the most. Concentrating all my brain-power on a subject that is so specific I am probably the only one interested, using language to force the readers into believing what I say is right and applying references from the most random sources, then constructing the whole thing in such a way that it cannot be argued against, ah… The joy. And as a hobby, with only my own deadlines! Yay!

I want to get a really cool job and blog about it. Ok, I realise it’s far-fetched but I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’ve seen it done. Perfectly normal people just start blogging about their everyday life and their interests, sprinkled maybe with some politics, cooking recipes or travel advice and a certain je-ne-sais-quoi, and all of a sudden their job is to blog about the stuff that interest them the most… All I can say is, it’s important to have dreams, right?

Why Should I Blog When I Can’t Even…

Can’t write a line a day, so why attempt a blog?

• fill out my One Line A Day book
• keep my catalogue on LibraryThing up to date
• organize my Evernote account
• write in My Booknotes Journal
• answer texts when I receive them
• complete a shopping list
• decide on a research question for my master thesis
• work continously for ten minutes without checking my Facebook, twitter and news reader for new posts? (can’t be bothered linking to these for obvious reasons)

For several years now I have easily sidestepped the blogsphere, or possibly, the blogsphere has sidestepped me. “Digital journaling” never appealed to me and the few blogs I came across, I stumbled upon accidentally and read only sporadically. It is no coincidence, however, that when I for the first time in two years am allowed to sit down undisturbed in front of my laptop for hours on end, is the time I discover blogs and, in fact, discover that I love them. Over the past two months, I have become an avid blog follower, with a google reader account and a daily ritual of scouring for new interesting people to stalk digitally. It was only a matter of time before I joined the herds of people “flashing their asses online”, as my uncle so eloquently put it during a round of “Facebook, good or evil?” over the weekend.

I am a master student and a master of procrastination. Not only procrastination, but also indecisiveness. Not only indecisive, but also with minimal concentration skills, ref. list above. And the closer I get to my dissertation deadline, the more these unappreciated “skills” increase, until I am reduced to a blabbering ball of nerves, shouting “It’s the middle of November and I have written nothing and it’s not my fault!!” at the top of my lungs to an unimpressed husband. He cooly replies, “if you get off Facebook I’m sure you will free at least two hours every day”, and of course he is right.

I managed to keep my shameful blog addiction hidden for a while, but when I continuously started my sentences with “I read this interesting thing online today…” in stead of “I wrote five pages today about…”, he naturally caught on very quickly and dissertation complaints will continue to receive very little sympathy until I change my wicked ways. Thus, the natural conclusion is that I arguably cannot blog due to the combined nature of time constraints and risks of self-sabotage with the possible outcome that I will never graduate.

Hence, welcome to my blog.