[1] My days have become between three and four hours longer.
[2] I no longer see multiple polls, every day, in which people designate Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, or Rush the greatest band of all time.
[3] No one talks about who should or shouldn’t be “centered.”
[4] I read more books.
[5] Random nobodies “calling out” and “holding ___ accountable” are no longer a part of my daily experience.
[6] I’ve almost forgotten that there are non-psychotic people who think that muons are conscious.
[7] J.K. Rowling has returned to being a writer of middling, popular juvenile fantasies about teen wizards and witches, rather than a phobic Nazi who wants to exterminate trans people.
[8] I no longer receive regular, public broadcasts about what someone’s wacky, genius, precocious, hilarious, virtuosic – did I say ‘wacky’? – progeny said at the dinner table yesterday.
[9] I haven’t heard a single thing about [or from] Jason Stanley.
[10] After reading for years about how “deeply,” “profoundly,” “literally,” “massively,” “seriously” people are X-ing, Y-ing, and Z-ing, adverbs have become more sparse in my daily interlocutions.
[11] The amount of smarm and snark in my day has plummeted to near-undetectable levels.
[12] I no longer see dysfunctional and personality-disordered people telling everyone else how they ought to behave.
[13] Days and weeks pass without a single thought of Elon Musk.
[14] Encounters with the following expressions have become rare occurrences: ‘Karen’; ‘Inclusion’; ‘Problematic’; ‘Privileged’; ‘Marginalized’; ‘Boomer’; ‘Zoomer’; ‘Equity’; ‘Diversity’; ‘Most Vulnerable’; ‘White Supremacy’; ‘Patriarchy’; ‘Harm’; ‘Canceled’. ‘__-phobic’.
[15] The number of fights I get into has dwindled to nearly zero.
[16] I am no longer told what is “trending” with regard to the Kardashians, Kanye West, Demi Lovato, Logan Paul and other such “celebrities” and “influencers.”
[17] I haven’t heard a single thing about [or from] Kate Manne.
[18] I no longer see philosophy professors and graduate students whingeing about how beleaguered and overworked they think they are [unless I visit Weinbergia or The Philosophers’ Cocoon].
[19] Much less of my time is spent with/on people who don’t matter in the slightest.
[20] I play more video games. [Compared to social media, this is time well spent.]
[21] My encounters with excitable, “social-justice” types have ceased almost entirely.
[22] I no longer have arguments with people who aren’t my peers but think they are.
[23] The overall amount of crazy/stupid that I see on a daily basis is a lot smaller.
[24] My ability to concentrate when writing or engaging in other activities requiring thought and creativity is much improved.
[25] My exposure to shameless promotion is limited to television commercials.
[26] The world I occupy is no longer one in which people “overshare” things about themselves.
[27] My life has become largely cant-free.
[28] A persistent sense of aggravation, lingering just at the borders of consciousness, has dissipated.
[29] Grown-ups presenting themselves as Anime characters are not something I see anymore.
[30] No longer captive to the momentary present [and the reactive mode that comes with it], I feel freer to devote myself fully to the writing I love the most: philosophical essays; literary autobiography; art and media criticism; and fiction.
