What's something you voluntarily do analog/off-grid/unplugged?

[sol]

This might also be a question of proportion of introverts to extroverts in any given neighborhood...as an introvert, I would always assume knocking on a neighbor's door would be unwelcome, except in an emergency.  Maybe I just have always lived in neighborhoods with high relative numbers of introverts?

Can an entire community be introverted?  I really think this is a function of the character of your neighborhood, more than of the individuals that comprise that neighborhood.  Yes, the two are certainly related, but in some places people habitually lock their doors because they worry about crime, and look at strangers with suspicion, and I don't think it's because those people are natural introverts.

[cerat0n1a]

Imagine that severity of the cultural shift between then and now, that my kids understand no part of that sentence.  Maybe they can live without doorbells, but I sure couldn't.

I live somewhere where people routinely walk to the shops and people typically say hello to passers-by in the street. We often have neighbours or friends ring the doorbell uninvited (and I suspect most of the people on either side of the door in these interactions are introverts.) The doorbell certainly gets more use than the landline phone.

My teenage children & friends consider it somewhat rude to ring the doorbell - the normal approach is to stand outside and text the person inside to tell them that you're at their house. (Where "text" may mean snapchat, whatsapp etc.)

[OtherJen]

When we remodeled our house four years ago, we took out the doorbell apparatus and didn't replace it. I now consider doorbells to be uninvited noise pollution.

That's an interesting development.  Do you think it's a sign of just how electronically interconnected we have become that we no longer feel any compulsion to even respond to an in-person visitation at your home?  There was a time not so long ago when you might literally never see another human being over the course of a week if your farmhouse didn't have a doorbell. 

What about the neighbor who needs to borrow a cup of sugar?  Your pastor dropping by to ask about your aging parents?  The kids next door who want to ride bikes with your kids?  The matronly lady up the block who heard you were sick and brought you some cookies?  Have we really become so callous to the pleasantries of face to face interactions that we deliberately choose to remove opportunities to have them? 

When I was a kid I use to have to go around ringing doorbells in my neighborhood once a month to collect the monthly checks from everyone on my paper route.  Imagine that severity of the cultural shift between then and now, that my kids understand no part of that sentence.  Maybe they can live without doorbells, but I sure couldn't.

These examples are intriguing.  I think I might be older than Sol, but I can count on 2 hands the number of times these sorts of interactions have occurred in my lifetime (that includes Ye Olden Days when people supposedly did these things).  This includes living in a small town, 2 very large cities, and 2 small/medium sized cities.

I've never experienced any of Sol's specific examples, unless you count the tendency of very close friends to drop by to visit for an hour as part of regular routes of errands...which did happen with one of my mom's/my friends when I was a kid.  Or the fact that I regularly have to knock on neighbors' doors to drop off mis-delivered mail (our postal worker has ISSUES).

The only 'knocking on doors/ringing doorbells' that I've ever regularly experienced is people selling things (ugh); trick or treaters; or very occasionally people needing to use my phone b/c their car broke down, etc (back in the pre cell phone days)...I also have knocked on doors once or twice for this type of reason...need to use someone's phone in an emergency.

I'm wondering if 1) Sol's type of example was ever as common as pop culture makes it out; or 2) if it was, when did it start to die out?  I do think my Grandparents experienced this type of thing more often, but my impression was that was the last generation that did, in America anyway.

This might also be a question of proportion of introverts to extroverts in any given neighborhood...as an introvert, I would always assume knocking on a neighbor's door would be unwelcome, except in an emergency.  Maybe I just have always lived in neighborhoods with high relative numbers of introverts?

Sol’s example sounds like my parents’ childhood neighborhoods (they’re early Boomers who grew up in the 50s/60s, but my experience as a kid in the 1980s was nothing like that. The only reason we knew the neighbors was because I played with their kids; when we moved to a neighborhood with fewer kids, we hardly ever saw the neighbors.

Our house didn’t have a doorbell when we bought it 15 years ago. It’s tiny; we can hear when people knock. No sense in wasting money to install an electronic noisemaker.

[sol]

Our house didn’t have a doorbell when we bought it 15 years ago. It’s tiny; we can hear when people knock. No sense in wasting money to install an electronic noisemaker.

Victorian houses had physical bells activated by pull wires or crankshafts, which presumably sounded more pleasant than the modern electronic version.  Would that qualify as something you might choose to do "analog/off-grid/unplugged"?

[OtherJen]

Our house didn’t have a doorbell when we bought it 15 years ago. It’s tiny; we can hear when people knock. No sense in wasting money to install an electronic noisemaker.

Victorian houses had physical bells activated by pull wires or crankshafts, which presumably sounded more pleasant than the modern electronic version.  Would that qualify as something you might choose to do "analog/off-grid/unplugged"?

My house is less than 1000 square feet and all on one floor. Why would I need to add something when I can hear a knock from any room?

[Retire-Canada]

We don't have a doorbell. And we pretty much don't care when people knock on the front door. Because all our friends come around to the back door.

[Gondolin]

Analog alarm clock and no phones in the bedroom.

[spokey doke]

Backpacking in the wilderness

[pressure9pa]

I wear a mechanical watch.  It is inferior to a modern quartz watch in every way; less accurate, less durable, more difficult to produce, and with fewer features.  But it is pretty, and I like the history of old timepieces.

After centuries of technological progress in horology, it represents the pinnacle of achievement of a totally dead technology, like the finest buggy whip, or a wooden sailboat.

I wear one was well, and I appreciate the history.  Mine belonged to my grandfather, and is engraved with a thank-you note from his company upon his retirement.  I know that my grandfather worked there his entire career, and missed only two days of work - one when my father was born and one when he was hospitalized.  The lack of technology and the reminder of my grandfather make it a pleasure to wear and a good reminder of his values. 

[Nickyd£g]

Hand wash & dry dishes, line dry clothes, budget using paper and pen. i read on my tablet occasionally but prefer real books. Real alarm clock, mobile phones disrupt my sleep.

[Schaefer Light]

I like the idea of not having a doorbell.  Might have to disconnect mine now.  I had never even thought of it prior to reading this post.

[StarBright]

I am militantly anti-smart phone (and I am a millennial) so I still do a lot of paper: directions, grocery lists, journaling etc.  I listen to a kitchen radio (though it is on the fritz and we may move to a smart speaker soon), and we walk the kiddo to school in the mornings.

Ohh - I also make my own pasta and pie crusts from scratch and we make popcorn using a whirly-pop! The whole family enjoys making pasta together.

[joonifloofeefloo]

Oh, light switches! My house has mostly normal ones, but for some reason one room is on a sensor and timer. Drives me nuts. I don’t need or want a light to come on every time I walk into a given room. I can also function in daylight, by feel, by memory, etc, and flick a switch when I actually need light.

I put a piece of black tape over the sensor to stop it.

Yes, popcorn in a pot too, kneading by hand, etc :)

[thd7t]

I like reading graphic novels (comic books) which I get from the library. Really good ones can be as good as watching movies except there's no cost beyond what you already pay in library taxes. Right now, I'm reading a series by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos called "Alias" which was adapted into a Netflix TV series called "Jessica Jones". It's riveting stuff that explores some really complex issues about violence and identity.

Bendis is one of the best comic writers currently active.  Not sure if I'd put him or Brian K Vaughn at the top.

They're good for long runs (and I'd take Bendis over Vaughan), but Warren Ellis is better (weirder).

[joonifloofeefloo]

Visiting new places/experiencing new things -

I don’t want to pull out a phone to find which curve to take in a new town. I want to walk one, see if I get where I was aiming for or not. At most, I want to ask someone I bump into for the next direction.

I don’t want to watch a video or even read a book about where I’m going. I want to get off a plane or boat and be surprised!

When I meet people that speak languages different than mine, I don’t want to use an app that will translate one of us; I want to rely on other forms of communication -eyes, gestures, sounds, touch- to connect...or just listen and enjoy not knowing.

[RetiredAt63]

My main hobby (fibre arts) is analog.  The only motor I have that is involved is the motor on my drum carder.  I wash fleece by hand and air dry it, I spin on a spinning wheel, not an e-wheel, I knit on knitting needles, not a knitting machine, and I weave on looms that are totally manual.

Gardening is also pretty un-plugged, although I do use the lawn tractor for hauling soil, etc., and that means I am using a gasoline motor.

[sol]

I don’t want to watch a video or even read a book about where I’m going. I want to get off a plane or boat and be surprised!

About twenty years ago, I walked off a plane at the Kathmandu airport at 11pm without any preparation.  I had just come from a three day party in Australia and flown with a wretched hangover.  No guide book, no currency, no plan.  I felt alive!  I was seizing the moment!

Then I realized that the Kathmandu airport had no electricity, it was dark, I had no money to pay for a taxi into town, didn't speak the language, and didn't know where a taxi might take me anyway.  I was seizing the moment, and the moment kind of sucked.  Sometimes just winging it doesn't work out.

I was lucky.  A nice British lady took pity on the stupid American kid and took him into town and gave him a place to stay until the banks opened the next morning.  Since that day, I try to read a book about where I'm going, so that I have something that at least sort of looks like a plan. 

Back then, everyone was carrying a Lonely Planet for guidance but I imagine it's all online these days.  I do agree with you that the places mentioned in the guidebooks tend to get swamped by tourists, and you can miss the real gems in a new location if you stick to the printed recommendations like everyone else does.

[joonifloofeefloo]

Oh yes, much of my travel has involved moments like the one you describe in Kathmandu. Dark, no local currency, nowhere to stay, transport shut down for the night. And then we figure it out, or simply survive a night of hardship, or a stranger helps us... Happy!

...though I kind of hope my kid doesn’t follow in my footsteps, ha.

[Cassie]

I use paper calendars and lists. I hang dry all my tops and bras.  I have finally embraced boos and newspapers online because they are so much cheaper and easier to carry around. The neighbor kids ring our doorbell when their ball flies over the fence. We had so many people selling crap and making the dogs bark that I bought a big grumpy cat sign with him showing his middle paw saying no soliciting. The few people that have rang to sell me something I ask them if they can’t read or are just stupid. Then I wait for a response while they mutter something as they run away. The sign is so big you can see it from the sidewalk.

[Imma]

When we remodeled our house four years ago, we took out the doorbell apparatus and didn't replace it. I now consider doorbells to be uninvited noise pollution.

That's an interesting development.  Do you think it's a sign of just how electronically interconnected we have become that we no longer feel any compulsion to even respond to an in-person visitation at your home?  There was a time not so long ago when you might literally never see another human being over the course of a week if your farmhouse didn't have a doorbell. 

What about the neighbor who needs to borrow a cup of sugar?  Your pastor dropping by to ask about your aging parents?  The kids next door who want to ride bikes with your kids?  The matronly lady up the block who heard you were sick and brought you some cookies?  Have we really become so callous to the pleasantries of face to face interactions that we deliberately choose to remove opportunities to have them? 

When I was a kid I use to have to go around ringing doorbells in my neighborhood once a month to collect the monthly checks from everyone on my paper route.  Imagine that severity of the cultural shift between then and now, that my kids understand no part of that sentence.  Maybe they can live without doorbells, but I sure couldn't.

These examples are intriguing.  I think I might be older than Sol, but I can count on 2 hands the number of times these sorts of interactions have occurred in my lifetime (that includes Ye Olden Days when people supposedly did these things).  This includes living in a small town, 2 very large cities, and 2 small/medium sized cities.

I've never experienced any of Sol's specific examples, unless you count the tendency of very close friends to drop by to visit for an hour as part of regular routes of errands...which did happen with one of my mom's/my friends when I was a kid.  Or the fact that I regularly have to knock on neighbors' doors to drop off mis-delivered mail (our postal worker has ISSUES).

The only 'knocking on doors/ringing doorbells' that I've ever regularly experienced is people selling things (ugh); trick or treaters; or very occasionally people needing to use my phone b/c their car broke down, etc (back in the pre cell phone days)...I also have knocked on doors once or twice for this type of reason...need to use someone's phone in an emergency.

I'm wondering if 1) Sol's type of example was ever as common as pop culture makes it out; or 2) if it was, when did it start to die out?  I do think my Grandparents experienced this type of thing more often, but my impression was that was the last generation that did, in America anyway.

Well, I recognize them and I grew up in the 90s, I'm not even 30 yet.

I did grow up in a village in Europe. People didn't actually rign our doorbell because everyone just let themselves in through the back door. Since we lived on a smallholding people didn't come by for a cup of sugar, but they came around asking for eggs, soup chickens, fruit and vegetables all the time. We also received stale bread from the local bakery that he would dump in our driveway every morning, to feed the chickens.

We weren't frequent churchgoers, so the pastor didn't drop by our house, but well-meaning neighbourhood ladies definitely did. The ladies in the street always collected money for flowers or fruit baskets whenever someone was ill, had surgery, had a baby, lost their job, etc. Whenever a house was sold, we'd decorate it for the new owners and put up a sign saying 'welcome in the neighbourhood'. We also decorated houses for weddings, wedding anniversaries and new babies. I played with all the neighbourhood kids and when I got a little bit older, I watched all the younger kids for pocket money. Every year at christmas, the paper boy would ring the door bell to wish us a happy christmas and we'd give him a tip.

My childhood wasn't as idyllic as this story makes it sound, but this super close-knit community was absolutely real. I'm sure it's still a bit like that in villages, but I live in the city these days and I miss it.

[joonifloofeefloo]

That sounds so beautiful, Imma!

I spent the last year living in a place designated a village, and those things didn't happen. I spent the few years before that in a hamlet, and those didn't happen there either. Some years previous to that I was in a different hamlet (fewer than 100 ppl) where this was the dream, but it didn't happen there either. Beautiful, progressive places but not infiltrate-y.

One of my in-laws is from a different village (in a different part of the world) and everyone and their chickens just wander in and out of each other's houses.

Where it happened for me was, interestingly, in two cities (very different parts of the world). In each case, I had happened to land in a subculture of this...of organically-developed, true community. These kind arise naturally, carry on for up to a few years, and eventually dissolve. Then we find it again somewhere else, or not.

I suspect it's more cultural than generational, geographical, etc.

I enjoy it very much when that kind of contact is my whole life vs a unique interruption in a very different lifestyle. I love my current gig, too, so I can happily go either way -just not some painful thing in between.

[BDWW]

Lots, design/draft and furniture building.

I used to use sketch-up quite a bit, but it kept changing slightly, and changed ownership, and generally became too much work.  Now I draw plans and perspectives in a journal by hand. It's always there for reference, and a lot easier to lug around when working.

I also do a lot of work by hand because it's often more efficient(or at least as efficient) for one-off pieces. I do use a table saw, band saw and planer for rough millwork, but most of the joinery is at least finessed by hand.

[middo]

I haven't had a clothes dryer for 20 years.

I love reading books - not on a device, but hard copy.

[sanderh]

What's something you voluntarily do analog or off-grid or unplugged as an intentional downshift or money saver or just because it's more fun?

Examples would be a clothesline vs electric drier, bicycle vs car, etc.

Clothesline, wash dishes by hand, bicycle, disposable razor reused for a month instead of electric.

[MishMash]

We harvest the bulk of our food, hunting, fishing, foraging (20lbs of chanterelles this week alone) I grocery shop maybe once or twice a month

[jengod]

We harvest the bulk of our food, hunting, fishing, foraging (20lbs of chanterelles this week alone) I grocery shop maybe once or twice a month

WOW! Where do you live?

[MishMash]

We harvest the bulk of our food, hunting, fishing, foraging (20lbs of chanterelles this week alone) I grocery shop maybe once or twice a month

WOW! Where do you live?

Maryland, right outside of DC believe it or not, there are a TON of areas within an hour or so drive that allow you to get outdoors.  And we have areas we can hunt across the country as well.  We caught over a full bushel of crabs last weekend for the cost of a pack of chicken drumsticks in MD.  With all the rain this year the mushrooms are EVERYWHERE and the container garden is doing well, so our total cost for eating the last seven days was about 5 dollars, most of that was the cost of the chicken legs for bait.

We also do a lot of bartering with folks we know, we process everything by ourselves, to include making our own venison and boar sausages etc, so other people give us their deer to process, and we take a 25% cut and return the rest to them in the form of pre made burgers, sausages, jerky etc.  And we also trade them, and the seafood we catch for other food.  This week it was 5lbs of Alaskan King salmon and some moose meat for some crabs and mushrooms from a buddy that just came back from Alaska.  Next week we are getting a crap ton of Berkshire pork from a friend as "payment" for going over his financial plan last month. 

[joonifloofeefloo]

Love it, MishMash! :)

[Vibrissae]

My teenage children & friends consider it somewhat rude to ring the doorbell - the normal approach is to stand outside and text the person inside to tell them that you're at their house. (Where "text" may mean snapchat, whatsapp etc.)

This is a revelation to me! I have a friend who does this, and I just thought it was weird, but apparently it's a generational/cultural thing.

[joonifloofeefloo]

^ I'm almost 50 and it's my preference (to receive and to offer) too :)

[PlainsWalker]

Pay bills by check.

    Other members of my generation look at me like I have an extra arm growing out of my head when they see the check book. I work on payment processing systems for a living and I've seen the sausage factory so to speak. A check is a payment instrument that carries the most consumer protections with it of any payment method. That and for some reason a few of my utilities want to charge me a convenience fee to pay electronically. I recalcitrantly decline to pay for the convenience of using a payment method that costs them far less than processing the paper.

[jengod]

We harvest the bulk of our food, hunting, fishing, foraging (20lbs of chanterelles this week alone) I grocery shop maybe once or twice a month

WOW! Where do you live?

Maryland, right outside of DC believe it or not, there are a TON of areas within an hour or so drive that allow you to get outdoors.  And we have areas we can hunt across the country as well.  We caught over a full bushel of crabs last weekend for the cost of a pack of chicken drumsticks in MD.  With all the rain this year the mushrooms are EVERYWHERE and the container garden is doing well, so our total cost for eating the last seven days was about 5 dollars, most of that was the cost of the chicken legs for bait.

We also do a lot of bartering with folks we know, we process everything by ourselves, to include making our own venison and boar sausages etc, so other people give us their deer to process, and we take a 25% cut and return the rest to them in the form of pre made burgers, sausages, jerky etc.  And we also trade them, and the seafood we catch for other food.  This week it was 5lbs of Alaskan King salmon and some moose meat for some crabs and mushrooms from a buddy that just came back from Alaska.  Next week we are getting a crap ton of Berkshire pork from a friend as "payment" for going over his financial plan last month.

Well done, you!

[Shinplaster]

Brace and bit instead of a power drill for smaller jobs.  I love the precision, being able to totally control the speed, and no batteries to go dead.

I like paper maps better than using GPS.  That might be a result of Garmin once trying to send me into a river.  I plan my routes using paper, and then use the GPS only if it concurs with my paper maps.   I love the old CAA Triptik maps too.