My ass and your Facebook

One of the other reasons I got away from blogging for a long time, in addition to the relentless shoulder piss-ups and various other idiocy, is that I have become beholden to the ridiculous Facebook god.

This is just so stupid, but I can't stop it. I love posting "updates," which unlike an update you might see on the AP wire (I am a newspaper copy editor, if you are new here) in which they tell you how many more are dead in the latest bus plunge in Mumbai, these are "updates" on what is happening in your life RIGHT NOW.

I now have 400 friends on facebook, a few of whom I actually know, which means I receive updates on people's "status" (not whether they are married or gay or whatever, not that there is anything wrong with either of those situations one way or the other) almost continuously. I remember belonging to a stupid Web chat board about something or other about 10 years ago, and one guy was always chiming in that he was eating something or other, or what kind of soda he was drinking, or what shade of beige his latest turd was, and it seemed just damned pathetic.

Now, it turns out he was years ahead of his time. These status updates keep you posted re everything that goes on with these folks every damned three minutes, which is amazing when you think about it because if they are looking at Facebook chances are they aren't doing a fucking thing to begin with, and then they feel a pressing need to "update" you with whatever they are doing, or pretending to be doing, at that very moment.

All this is tres stupido, to coin a phrase, because they often aren't really doing it at all. An example: A few minutes ago, I posted on my "status" that I was playing a particular fiddle tune, which I had been a few minutes before I updated my status but certainly was not doing at the time I posted the update, because how could I be posting an update on stupid Facebook and fiddling "Waynesboro" at the same time?

This would be mind-blowing stuff it was 35 years ago and I was sitting around at a Dead concert with a head full of peyote and bloviating about the whole riddle of time and space and all that other shit we used to talk about to impress ourselves with our own intelligence. (You see, I am most certainly no less of an asshole than anyone else. I want to make that perfectly clear.) Today, minus hallucinogens and after all these many years of my humbling fucking existence, it doesn't seem interesting or important.

But really, sitting around and doing these Facebook updates is about as productive as playing spin the bottle with yourself, which of course never did anyone any good.

But I can't look away from these things, these dumb goddamned "updates," and the worst part is that people can even comment on your updates, and you wind up getting involved in extended electronic conversations about trifles, things that you were doing at the moment a little while ago that weren't even at all important or interesting. Or, worse, things that you were pretending you were doing, and if that is the case for God's sake do us all a favor and go plant your head under an elephant's ass and beg it to sit down as hard as it can.

Oh, by the way, I am having a beer and going to bed after I get finished with this. I'll post an "update" after all that plays out and let you know how it worked out for me.