Facebook Friends: Gotta Catch 'Em All!

I recently cracked the 500 friend plateau on Facebook. That’s right, I am a Facebook Tool. 500 ‘friends’? Is that even possible?

These are friends numbers 157 and 369

500 acquaintances? Sure. 500 people I’m amicable with? Certainly. Friends? Uhh…yea, I don’t think so. While Facebook has certainly proven to be a useful weapon against friendship deterioration due to distance and/or lost time, it’s also developed into this bizarre web-based society that creates social links purely through passing handshakes or shared benches at the airport. If you have over 200 ‘friends’ on Facebook, you are guilty of this. I don’t care how much of a socialite you consider yourself.

Alas, a tragedy struck me sometime today: I dropped back down to 499 amigos. How did I react? The only natural way a 20-something raised in the age of information would…I frantically began searching through my friends list trying to figure out who the hell was missing. I even went as far as clicking on my closer friends’ lists and trying to make a comparison of possible missing faces.

At some point I stopped and realized this is fucking retarded. Firstly, if I can’t realize they are missing, it probably means they won’t be missed. Secondly, IT’S A GODDAMN WEBSITE ADVERTISING A PERSON’S ABILITY TO STALK THE PEOPLE THEY’VE MET AND SHITTY INTERNET GAMES FEATURING UZIS AND COWS (and this wonderful website which you should totally endorse by becoming a fan!) There is really only one logical reason why we all seem to fall victim to this nonsensical waste of time, and I’ve discovered what’s to blame.

Pokemon.

Holy. Shit. What happened to the good ole' days of just 151 of the lil bastards?

That’s right, Pocket Monsters, that insanely popular franchise with increasing numbers of elementally aligned pets who’s sole purpose is to be caught and made to war with each other (it’s Mike Vick’s favorite game!). Somehow, watching that little number above your friends list gradually climb upward fills that little gap in your life leftover from hours chasing Mewtwo through that damn cave. All we need to make this shit complete is a fucking lightning bolt to erupt from my best friend’s head.

It could happen.