de-active

I deactivated my Facebook on an impulse. Like, right now.

Since I returned, I haven't checked blogs and tweets, but I found FB hard to resist. I could feel myself being sucked back into a day spent mostly online in futile pursuits. And I didn't want that.

So, hence and therefore. We'll see how that goes.

In other news, I've come back with - and to - masses of books, more than I have space for or time to read. More on that in another post.

This is to reassure those of you who're used to seeing me online. I'm still on mail, guys!

Succumbed

A few days ago, Equivocal sent me an invite to join the Fulcrum list on Facebook. I politely mailed him back saying I don't do Facebook, or Orkut or any of these evil time-swallowing things. I mean, I do enough with blogs and Ryze and other stuff.

Pity, he said. There are some really interesting discussions about poetry there.

I hate people who know what strings to pull. I've been getting these Facebook invites for months now and I've successfully ignored every one of them. But this one I thought I'd check out.

Before you knew it, I was staring at a page that asked me to fill out some stuff and there I was a fully paid-up member of the Facebook community. In the next five seconds, my mailbox was choked with friends' requests and network invitations and god knows what else.

So I complained to Equivocal, who said, rather gleefully for the zombie he claims to be, "I lied if I said this was harmless. I am a facebook zombie and you've just been bitten by me. Welcome to the world of the undead."

Bah. I continue to ignore any additions on my wall (wall?! What are these guys - Kilroys?) Anybody who wants to communicate with me can do so via email.

Do you know the things people spend their time doing? Sending people fortune cookies, chest bumps, and joining networks that campaign for the removal of the 'is' on the status message on one's profile page. Who wants to know who is massaging whose liver and who is trying to grow another brain? I mean I know I have better things to do - like refreshing my page a million times to see if there's are new posts on Bloglines, for instance. That requires much concentration and a large expenditure of one's mental resources.

Wait. There's more. I get a mail telling me someone's done some scrappy stuff on Orkut. BUT I don't do Orkut! I've never been there, never done that. So how could anyone do anything on a Orkut page that doesn't exist?

This is sinister. I check out the link to see what happens, and it turns out that I have an Orkut page. I have no idea how. I also seem to be born in a wildly improbably year but hey - why stop at one weird thing? (Can you tell how much this is upsetting me? I've never used so many italics except in posts that have film or book titles).

Just so everyone knows, I Don't Do Orkut.

Facebook I shall look at but I shall be as silent as the mountains.

Where's Ignatius J. Reilly when you need him?

And Equivocal, those discussions had better be outstanding!