Bestest Facebook Buddies and Other People We've Never Met

I recently switched my Facebook page over to the “timeline” format. I’m done fighting the inevitable. (“You can’t stop the signal, Mal…”).

Do I like the new timeline format? Does anybody, really?  The giant picture across the top is pretty cool, but besides that I find the new format generally more difficult to both look at and utilize.  Makes my favorite pastime of cyber-stalking more difficult. Boo Facebook.

And, seriously, does anybody really want to know what I was doing in 1986? I think not.  And it’s not like I can remember anyway. But, the FB timeline is here to stay. We all might as well get used to it.

While I was switching over, I decided I would do an cursory examination of my  FB friends and see how I knew them. I was sure I could find something entertaining/thought-provoking to write about. 

You know what I found? Absolutely NOTHING interesting.  Nada.

(Just in case you are determined to avoid doing anything productive for as long as possible today, I have included my “Facebook Friends” breakdown graph.)

See how I wasn’t kidding when I said nothing interesting? I would imagine this chart looks similar to about 90% of suburbanite mom Facebook users. We know each other from high school, college, church, and kids' activities. Very not interesting.

What became most intriguing to me were the half-dozen people not easily characterized into one of my little statistics.  For example,  

under what category does someone fall whom I’ve never actually met in real life and is the ex-boyfriend of the daughter of friends I know because they also adopted a child from China?

(Follow that?? It's kinda like mother's hairdresser's cousin's sister-in-law, or some such nonsense) Ironically, this person is someone I interact with most – I find him delightfully insightful and entertaining. But if I saw him in a supermarket, I'm not sure I would recognize him.

Then there were three Facebook “friends” who I honestly had no idea how I knew them. I was certain I never met them in real life, nor actually interacted with them on FB. Oh well, I guess it would be rude to unfriend them now.

There are many different types of people on Facebook.  I have found all of following (heck, I’ve probably been half the following at one time or another):

  17. The "Blogger" - Posts annoying updates about their blog 2-3 times a week. (Ummm... how inappropriate! I say we kill them all!) 

So in the end, although I didn't really discover anything interesting, I guess it is good to know who my Facebook my friend are. It’s like the cartoon says, I love my computer because all my friends live in it. I just hope it never breaks - because then how will I have friends?