Saturday morning as I was gathering my stuff to go to Seattle for the weekend, I made the conscious decision to leave the computer behind.  We were staying with friends – and I decided my usual excuses for bringing it were just that – excuses.

Normally I would say that I’m bringing it for photos – I need to download them off of my camera and post them to the blog.  Since not officially doing the 365 Project, but taking pictures and posting them because I want to do it, I feel less pressure to post photos every single day.  That means no more running around at the last minute scrambling to get a photo taken just to have one up there to satisfy the 365 Project ‘rule’.  That also means my excuse of taking my Mac everywhere is pretty much gone.  (I have 2 memory cards that will hold 3000 images between them – two days, gives me no risk of filling that up.)

So, I left it at home. Took my iPhone – but didn’t feel like I was missing a greater view of the online world outside of Twitter and Facebook.

I also left my camera in the bag.  My friend and I talked about great places nearby to take photos, but we ran out of time and got doing other things.  Hell, I even had a great photo idea – but it was all in passing.  I’ll be honest – I needed to put down the camera. Even without the pressure, I sometimes feel I’m looking at life through the lens a bit too much.  It was nice simply talking and interacting without reacting to that “ooh, this would make a cool photo” impulse.  Nothing kills a mood faster than that, let me tell you.

And I was a bit tied up, so could not watch the Super Bowl. I had to rely on social networking to know who won. I didn’t see the screwed up National Anthem I have heard about on the radio. I do not have an opinion of the half-time show.  And I’ll take everyone’s word for it when I hear that the VW commercial was the best of the of year.  No clue if that’s right or wrong.  I was busy doing other things.

And I was tied up. Literally. I’ll talk more about that later, I’m sure.

So there were no blog posts. There were no photographs. No tweets. No Facebook status updates.

There was nothing but the mental images and memories of a good time with friends – learning to play cribbage, the picture of G’s face as he was totally confused by the game, the experience of making beer and smelling hops that I could recognize in my favorite beers, the view of the river as we attempted a run, talking as I watch a motorcycle being put back together, overhearing the smack talk as the kids play Wii, seeing the images of comic in the making, laughing at poor G as he has two backseat drivers on the way to the class, responding to a friend’s texts for her as she drives, laughing as the instructor tied up his rope bag in demo, and the confusion on my kids faces when all the adults told them the chocolate tart had mushrooms in it.

I definitely need to do that more often.