Pet Peeves (Part Four of an Endless, Multi-Part Series)

Pet Peeve: People who incessantly and obsessively update their status on Facebook. Status updates are the number one thing I loathe about Facebook (well, those and people sending me good karma or throwing a zombie at me or asking me to grow my garden or something like that). Mostly, I hate clicking onto "My Friends" to discover that this person is shooting a commercial downtown or someone else is complaining about their recent travel to St. Louis or that dude is talking about how they are recovering for such a fun night out and especially when this one guy uses status updates as a political forum. I think you might be able to categorize status updaters the following ways:

1. Far too smart for their own good. "John is is" or "John is post-modern freedom expression downtown at 7 pm" or "John tomorrow" (WTF does that mean?)
2. Annoyingly happy. "John is [insert Bible quote here]" or "John is so happy it's sunny today!" or "John is grateful for today"
3. Excessively bitter. "Jane is MONDAYS SUCK" or "Jane has been on hold with AT&T for 45 MINUTES!" or "Jane thinks this new Facebook thing is ridiculous"
4. Oversharers. "Jane is so excited for her rehearsal dinner and wedding and oh my god then the honeymoon!" or "Jane spent $45 on a cab to the airport but it doesn't matter because next stop VEGAS BABY" or "Jane is in labor! Sex unknown!"
5. Transparently self-involved. "John is recovering" (from what? the fun night you had that you need to not-so-subtly tell everyone about on your status? Okay, great) or "John is so annoyed he has to go to not one, not two, BUT THREE birthday parties Saturday night!" or "John is really sick of training for this triathalon. I just wanna drink already" (Okay John, DRINK ALREADY).
6. Oddly cryptic (this differs from the smart people because the cryptic people are less smart). "John is 41 flavors" or "John supports Darth Vader" or "John is STOP SCREAMING AT ME" (to all of this and more, I simply ask, "HUH?")

The few times I have used Facebook status it's been for the following: to inform people of a new cell phone number, to inform people that I'm using my old cell number, to post the URL for my blog, and yes once, to overshare/be annoyingly happy and tell people I was EXCITED FOR MAINE! That's about it though.

So a request to all my dear Facebook friends. Cool it with the status updates. Or better yet, use Twitter, where the details of your life aren't shoved down my throat.

(Then again, who am I to complain, what with my over-indulgent and self-involved daily blogging right? Maybe I'll go ponder the dualism of my character in my Facebook status. Look who's too smart for their own good now!)