FaceBook Ate My Brain

Several months back, I was merely being a bit sporadic with my blogging. I was working hard on getting back into my good habits...

Then FaceBook came along.

No, not really Facebook, more the evil, time-sucking, amusements known as FaceBook applications. You know the ones; cutesey little games with graded levels of success, bonuses, gifts for your friends and the like?

Well it all started out with Pet Society. A cute little custom pet that does stuff on your computer. Not so great by my description unless you think on the game's addictive qualities. The fact that you can buy really neat and cute things for your pet and to decorate your pet's personal little house, for example. Or that there are mini-games, gifting, gardening, Mystery boxes that harbor exclusive treats and goodies for your pet, and new, special, one-week-only items that are worth a lot on the trading forums....

Yeah, about that trading thing. See, You can trade goodies in Pet Society with other players. Different things have different values, depending on their perceived rarity. Like, say you want a black cat? That was put out Halloween of last year as a one-week-only item. Lots of people love and collect them. Very valuable, those. Likely you would have to trade two or three other, slightly ore new one-week-only or mystery box items for just one... If you are really lucky, AND the other trader is feeling exceedingly generous...

Of course, there is another way to go about it.

See, a lot of the folks who are addicted to one game on FaceBook are addicted to at least one or two other games... That means that you are likely to find folks looking to trade Fish Wrangler gold for a pink hearts rug in Pet Society, or Super Brie cheese from Mouse hunt for hammers in Egg Breaker, which you can then trade for pet food in Fluff Friends so you can barter for some Red Love Chum in Fish Wrangler, which you can then trade for gold, which you can then trade for that dad blamed pink rug you just HAD to have...

*sigh*

And you end up playing all of the games, just so you can get the best goodies for your little pretent pixellated internet pet, and each game takes a certain amount of devotion in the terms of time, and after a while...

Someone invites you to plant a garden or grow a farm, or run a virtual restaurant, and you start to play... "For just a couple of minutes" or "just a few days", you tell yourself. "Just to see what it's like and why your friends like it" you rationalize.

But it's already too late.

You are doomed!

Your fate was sealed as soon as you clicked on "accept" instead of "block this application", and you knew it before you hit that button, but you did it anyway.

Staying up until the wee hours of the morning every night, clicking your mouse, becoming a strange new type of being that gets barely anything valuable done each day, but has strong typing fingers, myopic computer-screen eyes, a constant migraine, and a broad talent for warming chairs.

So I've stopped paying so much attention to my silly little pet, all those eggs waiting to be cracked, and the little fluffy pet. From time to time, I still drop in to take a photo of some ghost or another, feed my pet in my quest for the elusive golden poo, plant and harvest some crops on my farm, or reel in an interestingly bizarre fish with a penchant for playing dress-up, but otherwise I'm done.

It was an interesting addiction diversion while it lasted, but now I have more important things to do. Hells, I had more important things to do then too, I just didn't do them.

I've managed to re-install a portion of my brain, and the synaptic repair process is well underway. I do warn you though, there may be times when the wires get crossed and the cranial server is down for a little bit, but please rest assured that we have our best techs working on rectifying the error. *wink*