Last Thursday at 11:42 PM, something unprecedented happened. My email inbox – that constant nagged waiting for me to digest – displayed the mythical number: zero. No bold unread messages demanding attention. No flagged items awaiting action. No saved drafts waiting to be worked on. Just strait, perfect, emptiness. My self-control forced me to collapse my window, as an unseen edge of panic rattled through my brain. How could someone live like this? I probed…
Last Tuesday, I whipped up the most secure password imaginable. It had everything a hacker would be scared of: special characters, numbers, upper case, lower case, and no links to my identity or any information I had chose or provided. Oh how lovely it was. There was no way it could be hacked. Digital Fort Knox. Seventeen seconds after creating it, I forgot it. The saying, “third times the charm” does not apply here. I…
Last Thursday at a private dinner, a colleague of mine was taken aback when I told her I did not follow the social media drama of a celebrity I had once heard of. That celebrity’s social media account is being discussed by so many people right now, I don’t understand how you missed it! Her fingers itched for her phone, desperate to tweet all about my blunder and shatter my bubble of lack of knowledge.…
Two Tuesdays ago, I suddenly remembered a dinner party that I attended. I had my friend Jessica’s dinner, and she was very excited to share the details of her recent job interview. As she filled me in on the company, rest assured I had already done a deep dive on the details into the scope of her undertaking three days before. I also had a ”No Wager?” moment at the appropriate time even though I…
Everything starts with an online article these days, and this one was no different. While scrolling the website, my eyes stopped at the heading “Digital Sabbath.” A concept implied not using any screens for 72 hours and allowing your brain to reset itself. I wish it stated something in the like, because the wisdom I stumbled upon while dooming at 1:47 am wasn’t really that helpful. As someone who built interfaces with the intention of…
On Tuesday last week, I took 11 minutes to write a two-sentence response to my colleague’s project proposal. It took me about thirty seconds to type. The other 10 minutes were set aside for what can only be described as digital choreography. I had to select the perfect emoji combination to ensure my response wasn?t interpreted as aggresive, uninterested, or overly enthusiastic. In the end I used a thumbs up as casual approval, a lightbulb…
The last time I remember having a problem understanding emojis was way back in September when my 13-year old daughter was staring at me in disgust from the other end of the kitchen table. I had just responded to my daughter’s text asking if she could go to the mall with large amounts of her friend’s emojis and for some reason she looked horrified at my answer. She texted, “Can I go to the mall…
It all began when I developed a headache. Not the pulsating headache that comes with a migraine, more of a dull throb behind my left eye during a Zoom call and it was still lingering in the morning. A pain like that usually gets taken care of with ibuprofen in my world. But considering the circumstances, which were not normal as it was a pandemic, every ache in my body made me ask: “Is this…
The time is now 3:17 AM and I’m in my kitchen, furiously arguing with my Alexa. “Alexa, turn off the lights in the living room,” I instruct for the fourth time, each desperate plea more exasperated than the last. “I’m sorry, but I cannot seem to find a device called living room lights in your profile,” comes the answer over the speakers with the blue light rotating. My hopes of her actually being helpful at…
Ending a romantic relationship can be very challenging both emotionally and physically, and given the current world, it is even more difficult when everything is connected online. My ordeal started three years ago when my relationship came to an end. I was unprepared to deal with the complex task of unraveling two intertwined lives, both physically and emotionally. For me, the practical level of the separation – packing boxes, handing over keys, and dividing furniture…