face off

**This is a post from last November that I found languishing in draft form. It still holds true, I think.

So I was poking around the internet looking for one of my old college roommates recently. Everyone does this, or "googling" would be a viable verb. But I found this roommate on Facebook, so I decided to get off my high horse and sign up, just to reconnect with her. Which I did. But then, quite quickly, people started coming out of the woodwork. I found my other two roomies from USC Class of '96, and then the high school friends found me, and the graduate school ones, and they told two friends, and so on; and well. I now have 29 friends on Facebook. Which isn't apparently a lot, but it is for someone who really just intended to find one old friend.

If you don't have a familiarity with how this works, first you identify someone, by name and photo, who is a "friend." Then you say they are your "friend." However, they have to confirm that you are, in fact a "friend" before you can actually see any of their information or otherwise interact with them. If they remember you, and they actually want to see what you are up to, then they confirm that you are a "friend." If not, they can choose to ignore your request. This, to me, is the pain and anguish that we went through back when we knew these people, wanting desperately to be accepted. It's a little too on point for me, if you get my drift. These are people I knew in high school and college, for cripes sake.

I find this Facebook world very odd. At it's core, it's a great idea. But very quickly it becomes, as my friend Jeff calls it, the "face-my-past-book." And then there are the statuses, which I don't necessarily need to know about. Do I really need to know if someone I really didn't like that much in high school is updating their Quickbooks?

Anyway, I've mostly shut it down in terms of "Alerts!" about who wants to "throw a snowball" at me, or give me a unicorn or some crap. Seriously a time suck, that Facebook.

also...

Update Mouse: the mouse seems to be gone. In case you were wondering. Below is a re-post of the comment Mr. Bump made to the original mouse post, in case you missed it.

We caught Stewart this morning, alive. I was starting to make tea, and saw him make a break for the stairs out of the corner of my eye. He's fast, but I have long legs, and cut him off from the basement, so he chose the closet, and then it was just a matter of time. I walked him across the street, pointed him towards the theatre, and let go of his tail--he was off like a shot, away from the likes of man.

What this fails to mention is that apparently Stewie had already had a bit of a chew on a block of d-con. But he's got a good chance. Whatever chewed the heck out of the block in the basement, however, clearly found some place to die, but we never did catch him/her. Hopefully he/she found a way out and is not currently rotting in to a pile of goo under the stairs. Mmm, who's ready for dinner?

Funny how I have nothing to say for so long, and now this verbal diarrhea in one day. Again, dinner?

hey y'all, remember me?

Remember when I actually used to post on this thing, rather than posting the results of ridiculous quizzes? I totally meant to do NoBloPoMo, but that didn't happen. Although to be fair, I was away from a computer, cell phone, or any other piece of technology for the first couple of days of November. I'm going to commit to a post a week or so, not that there is much to say. Let's see...what's been going on?

Oh, right, we're going to Africa. I know, right? Our trip won't be until September 2009, but since a big fat chunk of money has gone toward the trip in the last week, it's all I can think about. Specifically we're going to South Africa and Botswana, to a couple of safari camps, and then we're spending a few days in Cape Town after that, which looks just so beautiful. And it'll be spring down there, so hopefully the weather will be nice.

And if that weren't enough, we're going to spend a few days on the way back in Paris, partially to break up the agonizingly long plane trip, and partially because if you're going to fly through Paris, shouldn't you be allowed to see Paris? Mr. Bump is really excited about it too--the whole thing, really, but that little Paris add-on has come as such a lovely surprise at the end that we seem to be more focused on it that on the fact that we're going to South Africa! and Botswana!

One other trip to talk about, and then I'll shut up. At the end of this week we're heading down to Charleston and Savannah for a long weekend. It's my first trip to the South and I'm so excited. I may even start in on the y'alls before I get off the plane. Owait.

And if I can just get over myself for a minute, let me just say how glad I am that election day is finally here. I hope my guy wins. I hope. I hope.* I would go into more detail, but working for the federal judiciary means that I can in no way endorse a political candidate for any office, as it constitutes the appearance of impropriety. No bumper stickers, no yard signs, no attendance at a rally, or say, a political party's convention that happens in the very city you live in. All I can do is vote, basically. Which I have done. And I hope you have too.

*That's from The Shawshank Redemption and should not be seen as an endorsement of any candidate. Which I can't do. So I'm making it clear that I'm quoting a movie, and not the catchphrase of any particular campaign.