Not sweet.

Yesterday a server kept calling me sweetie. This slightly irritated me. I really wanted to respond: "Actually, I'm not that sweet". I wonder what on earth made him think it'd be ok to call me that.

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Today I was explaining to someone why I love New Order so much. Unlike other favourite bands of mine, I don't really own their albums, rather their singles collections. I grew up knowing their main hits. When "True Faith" came out I was a little kid in the U.K., and I still recall that iconic and strange music video that I watched from way back then.

Here's the thing about New Order. Imagine you're in a band, that is getting lots of press and new fans everyday, you're about to blow up, and then your lead singer who is one of your best friends...tops himself. He ends his own life. What do you do?

To my understanding - and, I haven't even read New Order's wikipedia page, so I could just be making this up - but what I think they did is, they took a hiatus. They mourned, they took a break, they regrouped, and came up with new sounds and rhythms and lyrics that took the world by surprise. Everything in New Order's music - from the instrumentation, to the vocals, to the lyrics - is wired with emotion. At least it is for me. Anytime I listen to any song of New Order's, and this has been happening the whole time I've listened to them, since middle school or high school - their music evokes emotion in me. It reminds me of something, it makes me feel SOMETHING.

No matter how many times I listen to their songs, it's the same thing each time - high emotion. I can work while listening to them, and I can also just sit and truly listen to them, and do nothing else. And that's honestly all I want to do right now, but I must go off and work.

I should read up more about them. I was told today that the band collectively wrote some of their lyrics. I wonder how they came up with this genius that I'm currently obsessed with (again):

"I was standing by the ocean when I saw your face
I couldn't look at you
I guess you knew it but I never realized
That we were through

And now I'm down here all alone
With every feeling that I own
You can't take that away

And with every breath we take
And the illusions we create
Will come to you someday

And I was touched
By the hand of God
Never knew it
But of course I was

I never hoped to do the things in this world
I wanted to
Because everything I own
It belongs to you

I never looked at you in a sexual way
In my life before
And I've never woken up like this
So desperately before

And I was touched
By the hand of God
Never knew it
But of course I was"

When I sing this song to myself, either in my head or out loud, I sometimes replace "by the hand of God" with "by that hand of yours". But seeing the actual lyrics, I see what they were doing. 

Bye bye bye

Somehow, the things I wrote about in my last post actually came true. I think a lot about technology and social media. Probably too much. There is a joke, something like, how do you know when someone is an atheist, or vegan? How? Well, that person will always tell you. I've become that sort of person in regards to social media, although it's usually a response to people asking me if they can add me on Facebook, and I tell them that I'm not on it. Hey, I'm answering their question! But then I seem like one of those people who loves to talk about how different they are ("I'm an atheist", "Actually, I'm vegan", "Yeah I do CrossFit"). Mine is "No, sorry, I'm not on Facebook. Would you like my email address instead?"

Not being on Facebook though, I'm forced to or they are, to exchange more personal info like email addresses. I left fbook in November. I say to people that I left because of the election, but actually I left near the end of November; as since I was alone in LA, I didn't want to be bombarded with photos of people's Thanksgivings, even though it's a holiday I myself don't celebrate (I appreciate invites though). Since leaving Zuckerberg's empire, I found that I was on my phone a lot less, and that I was a lot less distracted overall and much more focused on my work. I was also a lot less upset by the news, as I wasn't constantly reading about how everyone else is also always upset. I find now that I can read the Guardian headlines and think much more analytically and retain more information, rather than clicking on a gazillion links from fbook, from which I was never able to remember anything I read, all of the words just going in and out of my brain.

Try it, folks, it will do you wonders.

I also left Twitter. Though I have to log in once a month so that Twitter doesn't permanently delete my account (one day I think, I'd like to go through my old tweets, as they document my brain at those times). I also left Instagram too. But I found that, being off of all social media, I felt even more isolated. Would people back East remember me if they don't come across my profile/s? I do still exist. So I logged back onto Instagram. After a couple of days though I also took it off of my phone. I find that I've been able to kick the social media habit, as I've only glanced at Insta a couple of times from my laptop since then. Insta, I tend to reactivate every now and then.

Why do I spend so much time thinking about my social media habits and wanting to break them? Maybe it's because I know that overall that being off of Facebook has greatly helped my mental health, even though my social life has probably suffered as a result, as everyone else uses Facebook events. I am also terrible at making and breaking habits. So being able to wean myself off of this technology, is an accomplishment for me. I hope to do the same, with sugar. Inshallah.