Facebook is Magic

Happy Wednesday! I'm snowed in with my two kids today, which means I haven't been able to get a thing done and am already ready to start drinking heavily! It has been a long day, but it's all good. I'd still rather be here with my crazies than with the crazies at the office.

Last night I was cruising Facebook when I read something that irked me. There's this chick who always comments on a mutual friend's page, and I find her beyond annoying--offensive, stupid, crass, just... ick. So I did something I've never done before; I blocked someone I don't even know.

Blocking: what a wonderful tool. Being able to eliminate something bothersome with just a few flicks of my mouse is like owning a magic wand.

Why bother? Because recently I realized something about my online activity. I realized that I visited certain sites out of duty, not because I enjoyed reading them. In fact, some of these sites downright pissed me off! So I deleted those urls from my Favorites list and "unliked" their fan pages on Facebook. I unplugged from them entirely... and didn't miss them a bit. In fact, when I found myself only visiting the sites that I enjoy my entire mood improved substantially.

It's like this: a friend of mine once told me about something nasty an acquaintance had said about me, then she said sympathetically, "I thought you'd want to know." Truth is, I didn't want to know, and I told her so. I'm really happier not knowing if someone doesn't like me. Ignorance really is bliss.

This is essentially the same thing--I can't make people stop saying stupid crap online... but I don't have to read it. :)

Question: Have you ever blocked someone you don't know? Do you make heavy use of the "Hide" feature or just unfriend the annoying twats (we all have them) on your Friends list?

Facebook Pet Peeves: my brutal truths

Facebook is a funny place. I love it, I really do, but occasionally there are certain friends who fall into a behavioral rut of sorts. They're perfectly nice people (would I be friends with them if they weren't? Hell no!) but sometimes Facebook fails happen to the best of us.

I think we've all made the "vaguebook" mistake of posting a status report that subtly begs your friends to ask you to explain it. You know, like, "Beverly wishes today weren't so hard." The sole purpose of saying something like that is to get people to ask, "Why is today hard? What's wrong?" The best (read: worst) part about that kind of status is usually when people do take the bait, the vaguebooker will reply, "I can't talk about it."

WHA?

Vaguebooking is annoying and self-gratifying, as are most of my F-book pet peeves. CNN had a great article that sums up a lot of these folks perfectly, and my favorite funny Facebook peeves list comes from The Oatmeal, with their illustrated "How to suck at Facebook" list.    This one is my favorite:

Of course I have my own list, and it's kind of harsh.  As you read it please keep in mind that I am fully aware that I am no better than you at Facebooking and I know I've been guilty of some of these things myself.  I'm just calling 'em out because hey, it's my blog, and I can.  Bring on the brutal honesty!

The Sad Sack

When the Sad Sack is happy you don't hear much from her, but when she's sad expect hourly updates about how much the world sucks and how hard it is to be her. Sure, we all get the blues sometimes, but frankly the "woe is me" bit gets old. First law of Facebook Club: not every thought needs to be shared.

The over-sharer

* Is my poo supposed to be this color?

* I don't want to go to the doctor so I'm gonna list out all of my symptoms here and let you guys diagnose me.  Cool?

* I can pick stuff up with my twat!

* Got so drunk last night that when I barfed I peed myself!


We don't care, we don't want to know, and we don't need those visual images in our heads.  STFU!

The braggart

What she says:

"Ran a marathon this morning, then brokered a million dollar deal at work.  Now I'm baking a cake from scratch for my hot, wealthy husband while wearing nothing but high heels and an apron!"

What she doesn't say:

"I'm so insecure that I need to pretend to be perfect so people won't notice my debilitating lack of self-esteem."

The Zen philosophers

Every status report is about how enlightened they are and how gorgeous the universe is.  Yes, we get it - you're deep.

There's no getting to know these folks, sadly, because they don't ever offer you a glimpse into their lives.  It's not like we want constant updates ("I just ate a bagel!"), but spouting off cliches about how to live a better life helps no one and makes the rest of us feel like idiots for still thinking farts are funny.

All lyrics, all the time

All the cops in the donut shop say....

Sometimes these can be fun.  Personally, I like to throw out half a quote and ask people to finish it, because I have some funny friends and their responses amuse me.  However, I've got a few friends who only post quotes and they're always random and nonsensical; they sound like half of a Dr. Seuss poem or something.  I don't get it and neither do 90% of the people on your friends list.  Quit it.

The passive-aggressive type

They're talking to someone on their friends list, that much is clear, but they don't come right out and SAY they're upset with them.  They say things like, "I'm so grateful for my REAL friends who stand by me!"  These statements are designed to let you know that yes, you suck, and no, you're not a real friend if you don't know what she's talking about.

Get on that, will ya?  What's wrong with you?

WTF are they talking about?

I have one friend who comments now and then and never makes a lick of sense. It's as if he's been having a conversation that only he can hear, and now he's responding to something you said in his mind.

Since I'm not psychic OR a code cracker, I usually just ignore these comments only to have him say to me later, "Why don't you ever respond to my comments?"

Uuuuummm.

The shmoopy love birds

John Mayer: the face of Schmaltz

They just love to shout their undying love for one another from the rooftops, resulting in copious schmaltzy declarations about how perfect they are for one another, how handsome/beautiful the other one is, and how their union is better than anyone else's. Not only are these stomach-turning declarations irritating, but it leads friends to wonder if the lady doth protest too much. Sometimes it's the people who feel the need to gush who have the most to hide, perhaps even from themselves.

So sayeth Therapist Bev.

 Oh, extra dillweed points for people who sit in the same room and gush about each other on separate computers. Just shoot me in the goddamn head and get it over with.


Okay, hopefully I haven't alienated too many people with my frankness.

Now it's your turn -- what's your biggest Facebook pet peeve?

Friday Noggin Nuggets

'Sup, peeps?

Sorry I didn't regale you with TMI goodness yesterday. My boss was riding me like Secretariat and I couldn't get a free minute to do my usual blog stalking and writing. BOO! The nerve of him, expecting me to actually earn my paycheck!

Anywhooooooo. I'm not doing your typical OOBH Stew today either because I just didn't stumble across anything too wild & crazy online this week, so I'll give you a random sampling from inside my noggin instead.

It's a 4 piece Noggin Nuggets meal deal, which is way more healthy than a KFC Double Cardiac Arrest! They're crispy on the outside, gooey on the inside, just like yours truly.

Nugget One: April (snow) Showers bring May Flowers!

Woke up to this today:



Screw you, Mother Nature. Because of you I had to spend my morning explaining to my 2 year-old that it is not "Cwissmas!"

Nugget Two: Facebook n00bs make me laugh.

I have a cousin who we have always suspected is gay, but my family has a strict "don't ask/don't tell" policy. Not that we'd care, because it doesn't matter to us and it wouldn't change the fact that he's never been a particularly nice guy.



This week he joined Facebook and inadvertantly eliminated all doubt about his sexual preference. You know how people who are new to the 'book tend to blunder around like bulls in a china shop for a while until they figure stuff out? They post long personal messages on people's walls, address individuals in their status updates instead of writing on walls, and spam their friends with drink requests and the like? We've all seen Lame Book, we know how funny it can be!

Well my cuz posted a long-winded response to an old friend who had written on his wall. In it, he talked about hook-ups he'd arranged through a gay dating site (jackpot!), told the world that he's 45 and still lives with his mom, and admitted to dying his hair... right down to the Clairol shade.

It was... pretty awesome. Welcome to Facebook! Aren't you glad you befriended great Aunt Mildred? Oh, and let me be the first to say, "HA HA." :)

Side note: When my youngest sees Nelson on TV he immediately breaks out into a series of hilarious "HA HA's!" Cracks us up every time!

Nugget Three: Be afraid, be very afraid!

Tomorrow morning 16 screaming children will descend upon my home to eat cake, beat on a pinata, and generally sully my home with their grimy kid fingers. Little angels.

Yes, it's my son's annual birthday bash and this year I'm even less prepared for the melee than usual. I'd go hide & let them go all Lord of the Flies if it were socially acceptable, but I know that's frowned-upon. To make matters worse, this will be the first year that we haven't had a beautiful Spring day, so all the muddy little feet will be INSIDE instead of out in the backyard. FML.

Pray for me!


Nugget Four: I'm in the Phythics Club

Mala and I started a creative writing class this week at a local community college, and the first class was hysterical. Not the content so much, but the other students. Makes you realize that Joel McHale's show Community is pretty much right on target!

There were only six of us, but you couldn't get a more diverse group if you had gone to central casting and asked for a Breakfast Club special. Mala & I were definitely the Molly Ringwalds of the group, minus the prissiness and the virginity, obv.



We had:

The hippie girl with filthy-looking dreadlocks and a horrid neck tattoo and crusty lip ring. She spoke with a lisp and kept pulling jars of gritty mung from her bag and spooning it into her mouth periodically during class.

The unkempt Indian woman wearing layer upon layer of what looked like rags, with this wild hair that obscured her face. She immediately surprised the shit out of us by telling us that she's a practicing doctor at a local hospital. Huh - a reminder never to judge on appearances, clearly!

A 70-something guy with the world's most fantastic white hair. He drives a school bus in the worst part of Manchester and wants to write a book about it. Frankly, I'd read it!

A very nervous guy who uses air quotes WAY too often and seems to have some pretty glaring self-esteem issues.

and us.

I think I'm gonna like this class, yo! Excellent people-watching, if nothing else.

That's all I've got! Hope you all have a fabulous weekend.

P.S. Don't forget to scan those yearbook photos this weekend!! Monday it's SHOW ME YOURS day!!

FB irritants

I have a few Facebook-related gripes to unload, so bear with me.

Has someone ever copied your status and gotten kudos from their friends for how funny it is, but they never admit that they stole it from you word for word?

This happened to me yesterday. I was reading my little news feed and saw my own status report - I had just posted it an hour or so before and people were commenting on it. I did a double-take; it was my status report, yet it had been posted by one of my friends. All of her friends had left "Ha ha! Your to funny" (grinding teeth) comments on it, yet did she 'fess up and say, "Actually, it's the Bev who's funny. I just thought it was a good one so I posted it too?"

Nope.

It doesn't really bother me, don't get me wrong. It's not like I'm copyrighting my status reports, for goodness sake. I just think it's strange.

People are so odd.

Ever get copied on a never-ending message?

I was invited to a party several weeks ago. It seems the quirky (read: crazy) weather man at my last TV station was finally let go after the station changed hands several times and they're now focusing less on live news and more on, I dunno, Spanish-speaking cock fighting game shows or something. I don't know, I don't watch that crap now that they don't pay me to create it anymore. Anywho, a bunch of ex-cow-orkers were planning a party for Al and started a Facebook message to discuss the details of the event. There were about 20 people on the message list, including yours truly.



I decided early on in the planning process that I wasn't gonna go. My trusty sidekick was going to be out of town and I had my surgery to get through, plus it seemed like everyone who was going were Newsies and I was more of a Production Goddess.

Yet I kept getting the emails. Every. single. day.

Soon the messages deteriorated into "witty" banter about how drunk everyone was going to get, funny things Al might say, and "hilarious" reminiscences of the station's hay day. At this point, I just went ahead and deleted them without reading as soon as I logged into FB, but still - the multiple email notifications per day as well as the constant "housekeeping" on Facebook was reeeeeeeeeeeeaaaally getting on my nerves.

I'm a teensy bit OCD about FB, you see - I cannot have tons of unanswered messages or notifications glaring at me. I must get rid of the little red numbers before I can peruse people's status reports and leave my inappropriate and subtly pervy comments!



The event came and went, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Now, maybe I could get some peace from these incessant notifications about an event which I had no intention of attending.

Then the idiots went and STARTED A NEW GODDAMNED THREAD to rehash their fun night and start planning another one... in motherfucking MAY!

fkjas;fkjadsf;iae sdfasdjkfasdf; jasdfk;sdja;fijsd;fkasdj f;kdafj asdk;fjas;ifj;iadjrtio;werv!

(That's the sound of my head exploding)

So, lemme get this straight - I'm supposed to put up with 5-10 email notifications per day about a party I declined an invite to, and now about a party that I probably won't go to either... for the next 3 months?! Fuckin' A, dood. Stick a fork in me, 'cuz I'm done!

Okay, enough of me bitching. It's a beautiful sunny Wednesday, and I'm going to pretend that I didn't cry into Dr. Duk Dong's white coat this morning when he told me he wanted to fry me again and I told him where he could cram his radioactive iodine. The appt was a bummer and a total waste of good mascara, but the day is young and my good spirits will prevail, damn it.

Because they must.

Have a happy Hump Day, Humpy McGees!

Pour some Friday on me

Hello, cheeky monkeys! Sorry to dump on ya yesterday, but thanks for the nice comments and for bearing with me. As is almost always the case, once I purge on my blog I usually end up feeling better the next day. Call it an "Airing of Grievances," if you will.

One last thing about this voice crap that I have to tell you because it's kind of funny - you don't realize what role your vocal cords play in your every-day life until one of them shits the bed on you. For instance, swallowing is hit or miss (stuff goes down the wrong tube a lot - STFU fellas) which makes me cough, and I currently cough like a 90 year old with emphysema (NTTAWWT), and last, well... yesterday I sneezed a couple of times and BOY was that a shocker! It sounds like an explosion! CRAZY! I am soooooo lady-like. *snort*



BUT, it's getting better - BECAUSE IT MUST - so I'm going to ignore it and move on.

Shall we walk & I'll show you some funny things I've been collecting this week? (linking arms)

Let's!

First off, we need to discuss two of this week's many Facebook memes. The first is the Urban Dictionary one which involves going to Urban Dictionary.com and typing in your first name to get the definition, which you then post to your FB profile. A lot of people couldn't post their first UD name meanings because they were too dirty for Facebook; since that's NOT a problem here at the OOBH, I invite you to share them here in the comments section! Personally, I loved mine and would have it tattooed somewhere on my body if I were into that sort of thing, which I'm not. Check it out - disregard the last line.

one who is bringing sexy back; one who is a mammajamma; one who is straight up gangsta; one who is a BFF; one who takes M-Diddy to prom; one who mingles with chemistry teachers; one who has hott buttery buns; one who is hillbilly

YEAH, baby! I love-love-love it. :) What's yours?

Secondly, there's the one where you're supposed to change your avatar to your celebrity doppleganger, but that didn't work for me because I don't resemble anyone famous! What can I say? I'm one of a kind....

When I asked my friends who I looked like they said:

Liv Tyler & Lauren Graham.



After I stopped laughing and thanking them profusely, I told them I didn't see it.

Do you have a celebrity doppleganger? Who is it?

What about the celebs themselves? Who do they pick as their FB dopplegangers? According to Holy Taco:



Last but not least, I found this funny website where an actress-type chica makes webisodes of a show she calls "Very Mary Kate." She plays everyone's favorite anorexic monkey troll/actress and they're all short and really FUNNY! This one's my fave:

Very Mary-Kate, Episode 3 from Mary-Kate Olsen on Vimeo.

So that's my funny shtuff. Hope you liked it as much as I did!

Big weekend plans? I'm just hanging around with my kids this weekend because my BIL is coming to take my husband out of my hair skiing. Will I be watching the Super Cornhole? Nope! Since there won't be anyone around to force me to pretend to enjoy it for the sake of the overpriced and overhyped commercials, I'm gonna skip it. Will I still buy and eat hot wings? You bet your sweet bippy! Bev likes her chicken spicy.

Have a nice weekend, all!
XOXO

Did you know?

That if you're on Facebook and you Google yourself, bits of your profile show up on the search?

I have to laugh:


First of all, the random friends that show up are cracking me up. That first guy? The mayor of Manchester. Yep. We're like this. Secondly, every time you ever say you're a "fan" of something, it shows up. Therefore, let the Googling community know that I am Bev and I LIKE BACON. And vino, peace, and NPR. Yes, I'm a peaceful, wine-drinking, bacon-eating, radio-listening gal.

Not that it isn't true, but.... Whatever. Just thought it was kind of funny.

Incidentally, you only get this if you Google my maiden name. If you google my married name, the search is taken over by a romance novelist of the same name. Her books look quite raunchy! I think I need to pick one up ASAP. ;) Also, whenever I get around to finishing my own little masterpiece (which is collecting dust on my laptop right now), I'll need to publish using my maiden name, apparently. Because, you know, the publishers will be beating down my door.