Last night, I slept the sleep of someone unburdened by the current state of American politics. Beginning at 7 p.m., I instilled a total Presidential Debate Blackout. No one was allowed to text or call me about the Hillary vs. Trump showdown. Twitter and Facebook were off limits completely.
I didn’t have a “good reason” for the blackout. It’s not like I have a doctor’s note to keep my blood pressure down and refrain from vigorous political discourse. I’m not apolitical, nor am I someone who hates both options — actually, I really, really like one of them and detest the other with the fire of a thousand burning suns. Being the owner of a uterus and a believer in human decency, I have some literal skin in this game. But debates strike me as gaudy entertainment and fresh fodder for HOT TAKES, and not much more. But like, Democracy, right?
finally the whole country will watch as a woman stands politely listening to a loud man's bad ideas about the field she spent her life in
— Alexandra Petri (@petridishes) September 26, 2016
Not watching was as easy as deciding that the world would be the same tomorrow. Nothing world-altering was likely to happen live on that stage, under the watchful eye of Lester Don Holt, Jr. I knew I could catch up on the event selectively in the light of day.
It’s now a little after 9 a.m., and the most I know about the debate is that it happened and no one died. Someone sent me a video with the caption “debate recap,” and I know without watching it that it’ll most likely be someone recording their television with a Snapchat filter over the candidates’ faces.
Here’s what I did instead of tuning in:
- Went for a run.
- Made popcorn and ate it.
- Mixed the last bits of some pistachio and chocolate gelato pints together with some raw cookie dough and ate that. Unfortunately I wasn’t employing Tip #3 here, but it was still pretty good.
- Made some space in my phone to update Vine, which led to finding this:
https://vine.co/v/5vgQqmmgFj0
- Bought my first website domain. In the process, took the time to learn what ICANN and WHO-IS are and made a better registrar choice as a result. This almost feels like more of a win for my political conscience than watching the circus. Edward Snowden would be proud?
- Opened Tweetdeck out of habit. It looked like this:
- Closed Tweetdeck.
- Decided I want to take a train trip from Chicago to LA.
- Realized that’d be a 40+ hour trip. Decided to rent a car instead or do literally anything else. Close all train-related tabs.
- Watched the last episode of Transparent. This is the first episode that didn’t make me cry. Awesome!
My boyfriend called me around 11 p.m. I missed it, but texted back: “If you’re calling me because you’re hype about the debate, please don’t.” He called his mom, instead.
So here it is, the morning after. Like a drool-faced blackout mistake, I’m rolling over in my social media bed and staring into the face of, “What happened last night?” Here’s the video I couldn’t bring myself to open this morning. This is probably all I need to know about the debate.
debate recap pic.twitter.com/KfnaH6C7pw
— Seinfeld Current Day (@Seinfeld2000) September 27, 2016
