The Internet is a wonderful invention. Information that once required a visit to the library is now available in seconds. Although I’ve retrieved useful information from the Internet on everything from the weather to how to remove wallpaper, I also enjoy wasting time online, particularly on Facebook.
I can rationalize my decision. First, Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with family. I check Facebook on my lunch break to see if there’s any new pictures or videos of my grandchildren and I’ll check in at night to see if anyone in my family’s posted pictures. We live far from each other, and Facebook keeps me up to date on what’s happening in my siblings’ families.
Just like when the old codgers sat on the front porch and talked about the weather, Facebookers do the same, except in cyberspace. come up with all kinds of weird names for freezing weather – Icepocalypse and Snowmageddon are my favorites.
On Facebook, you can learn about the 50 foods you must never eat after a certain age and get warnings to not undergo Botox treatments or you’ll end up looking like an Egyptian mummy.
There are also miracle foods and secrets to keep us looking young that, up until Facebook miraculously came along, have strangely never been revealed.
Speaking of foods, Facebook is full of recipes from how to stuff artichokes to how to grill zucchini. Over 48,000 people like the healthy recipe page while over 202,000 people like the chocolate recipes. That many people can’t be wrong.
Then there’s the practical side of Facebook. Every insurance company in America has a Facebook page. Better yet, Facebook can save me to 70 percent on furniture and hook me up with major discounts on clothes that look like they fit a Barbie doll.
Think the end of the world’s coming? Facebook has you covered. You can discover how to grow 100 pounds of potatoes in a four-foot garden and join the other crazies because on Facebook, conspiracy theories spread like butter on a hot bun.
Luckily, there’s always a rational Facebooker who posts a link to Snopes.com and straightens out all who believe roach eggs are mixed in with glue on the backs of envelopes.
There’s Throwback Thursdays, a place for you to post every embarrassing picture of yourself from the 1970s wearing tube socks and short shorts with white piping around the edges.
Some of my Facebook favorites are the selfies. There are very few people on Facebook who haven’t held their phones up over their head, smiled and snapped a selfie and then posted it to Facebook. When your mother posts a selfie, you know it’s time to find something else to do with your phone.
And then there’s the complainers. They post about everything rotten in life, but I wonder if they realize they’re part of the problem by consistently griping about every single thing that happens.
I decided not to add to the wasteland. I don’t post what I had for dinner, send out chain emails or send you a link to watch my Facebook movie.
I don’t play Candy Crush, I could care less about the secret Ellen’s been hiding and I’m not interested in taking a Carnival Cruise. I just want to see pictures of my grandchildren and drool over the chocolate pie recipes.
And if there is a magic pill that will make the pounds drop off and the wrinkles go away, there’s only one possible place to find it – Facebook land.