My husband and I have agreed that we’re going to try to take a month off of Facebook. It’s so easy to get caught up in surfing that feed and getting frustrated or angry at people who have a difference of opinion than my own on the importance of wearing a mask, or the incompetence of our President. My husband is even worse than I am and peppers his “friends” with shared posts delivering scientific facts that he hopes will change their minds. He’s currently unemployed and I could see him spiraling into an unhealthy aggravation that we can easily avoid. So, we have agreed to call it quits with Facebook for one month. One week in and how are we doing?

Well…. I do check in on my blog Facebook page to make sure my posts are delivering but I have not gone through my feed. So I think that’s a success! I think he’s done even better and truthfully I can see a difference in both of our attitudes. We’re a little calmer, and much happier not re-hashing what so and so said and getting ourselves amped up over the stupidity of people we haven’t seen in thirty years.

Why do we still traverse the Facebook universe? I’ll admit, I do get some comments on my The Reading Chick page and I have a friend who has a group for her home business Color Street nails and she plays games and posts photo’s of manicures which sound stupid but are really fun to look at. Other than those two things I can’t say I want to go back. Then, if you throw in Zuckerberg’s views about not policing fake content, do you really want to support that? I’m mulling that one over still.

What are the things I’m turning to instead of Facebook?

1)My husband and I spend $12 a month on the NY Times digital subscription where with that subscription we also get the NY Times Crossword puzzle app. We do a LOT of crosswords. LOL.

2) I also scroll through my Twitter feed, but gosh the book nation on Twitter is just as political as the Facebook nation. Everyone is so opinionated about EVERYTHING. So, I may cut back a little on the Twitter account as well.

3) Pinterest! I love looking at pictures, reading nails, and looking at clothes I’ll never wear because I’m in t-shirts and shorts 24/7 working from home.

4) Tending our family garden. This is probably one of my favorite activities at least once or twice a day. If I need a break from work? Check and see if the tomatoes are turning red. If our cucumber crop is about to need picking- look up cucumber recipes on Pinterest! Did you know you can make cucumber bread? Yeah, kind of like zucchini bread. Funny! Who knew!

5) Bake/Cook- I made some awesome Cardamon, Orange, Dark Chocolate Chunk shortbread cookies that were to die for. I’m really interested in odd flavor combo’s lately and this one was great. Look it up on Pinterest and give it a try. Also, last night was Greek night in our household. We had all the cucumbers to make Tzaziki dip, Cucumber dip, we made hummus, cantaloupe, grilled some beef and home grown zucchini and voila! Greek night. It was pretty damn good. 🙂

6) Read more books on my TBR and watch some Netflix and chill. Pretty self explanatory, right?

You get my point though. We don’t need to do things that make us crazy. For me and my husband that was trolling Facebook. If you find yourself getting aggravated, I think you should give it a try. If you need help finding something to do I’ve got this great recipe for Green Tomato Salsa Verde I can share if you’ve got some time to burn.

Taking care of yourself means taking care of your mental health too!

Stay safe, stay calm, and reach out if you need to talk.

Deb