A Time to Cull

A friend of mine recently declared that if the vast majority of her friends on Facebook called her up and asked her out for a drink,* she'd drop the phone screaming, leap in a taxi to the airport and change her name to Babylon Nunchucks.

Now, while I'm quite attached to 'Mr Christopher' and, in the event of flight, would steer towards a less 'blaxploitation' moniker anyway, I do know where she's coming from. Sick of status updates from someone I met once in a pub three years ago, wall-to-walls about what "gr8 banter" Thailand was and endless albums of 'Random Photos!!!', I can't help but think that streamlining my friends list might not be such a bad idea.

So it was with this notion in mind that I set out this afternoon firmly determined to cull my roster by at least a third. Cup of tea by my side, hands ominously poised over the keyboard, I twinkle my fingers and begin.

My eyes race down the register and swiftly I come to Borderline Buddy No. 1. A former classmate who despised me at school, and then a few years ago presumably thought "Hey, that Mr Christopher! Must get in touch with him and satisfy myself that he's HAVING A LOATHSOME TIME."

How the tables have turned, Borderline Buddy No. 1! Let's have a look at your profile picture. There you are, grinning away - no doubt recalling the chemistry lesson in which you 'accidentally' called me Pisstopher (very funny, WHOREDERLINE BLUBBY NO. 1). Wall crammed with posts from old classmates, photos of 'Random Nites Out!!!' in the same old pubs, job info stopping squarely at Tesco, 1999-present.

You seem nice enough, but why on earth are we friends, Borderline Buddy No. 1? We have nothing in common. I'll never need you for a favour. You offer me nothing. REMOVE FROM LIST.

Hold on a minute. What the hell is happening? For how long has my chief criterion for friendship how useful a person might be? When did this happen?! OH MY GOD, AM I W*NKER?!

Undelete, undelete, add as friend, add as friend.

And this thought process basically repeats itself all the way down the list. Too frightened of being a self-serving b*stard to remove anyone, I am left with a friends list that remains as flabby and diluted as ever, a dull sense of guilt over The Person That I've Become, and a cold cup of tea that I spilt on some paper about half an hour in.

And the realisation that I've just blogged about Facebook is enough to make me hurl my computer out of the window, leap in a taxi to the airport and befriend a rabble of beach-living technophobes with no networking potential. Because I am NOT THAT GUY. Fellas, meet Huggy Funkenstein.

* Individually I mean, not en masse. That would set anyone's alarm bells ringing.