Awkward hugs and ignoring "friend requests"

I enjoy hugs and other expressions of caring for someone.  I’m just not sure I like them or know how to react to them when they come from people I barely know.  Recent Mingler guests, whom I had just met that night or once before, have taken to hugging me as they leave.  While many Mingler guests are a little tipsy by the end of the evening, these Huggers have all been sober.  There have been an alarming number of awkward “Saya holds out hand to shake but is quickly engulfed in an embrace” scenarios.  Additionally, other people with whom I have almost a non-existent relationship with are signing their emails “Love, ” and “Hugs, .”

Which leads me to “friend requests.”  I have spent a large amount of time these past couple of months ignoring or declining friend requests on Facebook and other online communities.  I don’t know the etiquette here, if I’m being protective or bitchy, but I certainly am clicking on “Ignore” a lot.

Reasons I Ignored Your Friend Request:

1. I have no idea who you are, you Friended me because of a) something in my bio or b) my pic [these requests 99% of the time come from males; I'll rant about initiating contact with someone solely based on looks in another post]

2. You are a professional contact or a family member or a friend’s parent and I don’t really want you seeing me calling my Asian friends “Egg Drop Soup” or pictures of me with someone else’s shaving cream handprints on my breasts; though if you’re reading this blog, that pretty much shreds any shroud of secrecy

3. I know you but don’t care much for you

4. I know you from seventeen years ago, we haven’t talked since, and you don’t include a personal message in your Friend Request; this just makes me feel you’re trying to win the prize for most friends

5. I know you and don’t dislike you but don’t really want you knowing the goings-on in my life