Testimonies// Facebook, Facebook on the Wall, Whose the Fairest of them All?

'Zemotion' on deviantart.com takes the most stunning portait photographs. I wouldn't mind having her face.

Well here I am again.
I've been blogging more frequently because things keep surfacing.
Also I was looking around at blogs for something of quality to read but lately there's nothing really substantial out there. People have been posting less probably due to finals or it's stuff I'm not interested in reading- like copy-paste excerpts.

The first time my friend and I were at the bar, she bumped into another friend (let's call him Joe for the sake of simplicity) whom she had not seen for three years. Small world. They started speaking about another mutual friend (let's call him Dan) of theirs who started going to church for the girls and how he likes to preach about it church and christianity to Joe. Joe starts going on this mini rant on how he hates it when Christians start preaching to him and whenever Dan does he would shut him up: "Now Dan knows better not to talk about church because I f*cking made it clear to him not to."
My friend in reply, says that she does not mind when people talk about church as long as they talk about their experience/testimony. If she wanted to know more about the 101 on Jesus and redemption, she'd pick up a Bible to read- why bother listening to the person if they're just going to spew out Bible verses?
Almost forgetting that I was there, she turns around and reminds me that she has nothing against church or christianity. Joe also reiterates that he is not anti-christian but he hates it when Dan starts preaching.
That's fine with me. I understand. Point proven.



So I was reading an article on Gummi's blog concerning the increasing narcissism seen on internet sites like Facebook.
Right before I signed up for Facebook in February/March I typed in 'f' on the url search bar at the top, somehow savouring the fact that 'facebook.com' was not in my cookies/history database. Because I knew, as soon as I sign up, that I'd be checking it at least once a day and every day when I type in 'fa', 'www.facebook.com' would magically appear and I'd scroll down and press enter.
I'm prone to falling into this trap of narcissism- perhaps I already have but there are some things on facebook that I allow myself to do and others, I don't because I know it will become a pursuit of vanity.
I do allow myself to have photo albums although I sometimes question why I put them up in the first place. Honestly, I have them up for four reasons:

1)the photographs all tend to be in my camera and friends want photos and having it on a 'controlled' environment like facebook (webshots is annoying and I dont want to sign up onto other sites) so I upload for them
2)so that people know what I am up to and doing. Bluntly, yes. Narcisstic, yes. I also have a lot of friends around the world so it's the easiest way to summarize. Pictures speak a thousand words!
3)Because I have a lot of subjectively awesome (also art nerd) pictures. And because photography is a hobby, I like putting them up.
4)I'm a visually driven person therefore images make me happy.

No, I do not spend a lot of time concocting up a catchy photo album title- I do tweak things in the albums so they run nicely together but that's about it.



The things I do not allow myself to do include:
1)Changing my profile picture: although sometimes I am extremely tempted to change it, I know that if I start doing so, I will become addicted into finding the most flattering/coolest picture of myself and/or with my friends. And... yeah. I don't want it to get out of control. I see on the news feed people constantly changing their profile picture and it gets a little ridiculous like they're trying too hard to advertise themselves and their artificial awesomeness. Just now, a total of 47 'friends' changed their profile pictures. So that's why I've never changed it. But if you ever see my profile pic change, it's because I just really got sick of the picture.

2) Applications: I got the ice cream one because robyn wanted me to but I'm going to take it down probably because it's just too much for my eyes. There are some really retarded ones out there. Just for fun? Sure. But it's annoying when it takes two minutes to scroll down someone's facebook just to get to their Wall. Although I don't ban them entirely from my profile, I'm trying to be selective.

3) Profile information: One of my biggest pet peeves about facebook, and I know this is going to sound like a personal attack on certain individuals, is when people constantly nitpick and change their interests. Honestly, who gives a darn if you like snowcones, gingerbread men, autumn leaves, laughter, hot chocolate on winter days, oil paint, family gatherings, penguins and velvet black skies? Honestly, no one cares. No one cares if you suddenly had a preference for kiwis over mangoes. On my news feed it constantly says "____ likes snow covered trees" and then a day later it says from the exact same person "_______ likes blueberries"
I've chosen to keep mine really broad: baking, photography, art and whatever because it's something general but not nitpicky enough to really show anything else. People constantly change what books, movies, music and tv shows they like. No one cares. So what if you enjoy 'War and Peace'- good for you.
Seriously, people refine them so much, it's a little obsessive and looks rather needy.


It's why I cherish my blog so much and also why I don't connect my blog to my Facebook. I need that smaller space of privacy despite my blog being public, not that many people know about it. At times I'm tempted to let everyone know so they can know me better, but I know in the end, I'd just end up writing what I think people want to hear or write diluted posts to avoid offending anyone in my proximity.
Facebook is also rather shallow- it does nothing for me but to get to certain events or contact some people (who I can obviously call- well the ones in NY at least) while my blog is really something I can say I love because I've developed it for so long. Trust me, I get bored easily, so this is saying something. Unlike most products that deplete with age and use, my blog gets richer with every post.

Yeah, that's it. Sorry, it turned into a mini rant. :S