Keep Hoping Machine Running (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thefourthvine) wrote2006-02-11 10:52 pm
thefourthvine) wrote2006-02-11 10:52 pm
Entry tags:
Super-Wanky Special Poll: Nobody Loves Me, Everybody Hates Me. I Think I'll Go Eat Trolls.
Except, see, I really don't want this to get wanky. I'm just not sure there's any way to discuss this without wank, although I'm going to try. Try really, really hard.
And please keep in mind, as you read this and select various boxes of clickiness, that I am not asking why no one loves me. Because, actually, I feel very loved. (Um, yeah, the title of the post and the poll would seem to argue otherwise, but my feeling is: if I'm going to post on a topic of potential wankiness, I might as well make fun of myself. That way, at least it will be amusing. To me, I mean.) LJ has been good to me.
It's just that anniversaries are much on my mind lately. (Best Beloved and I will be celebrating our, um, somethingth year together tomorrow. We still haven't figured out just what number year it is, though.) And my LJ anniversary is coming up, so I've been reflecting on it, in my usual mature, considered manner. ("Hmmm. Two years? Really?" [pause for thought] "Oooo! Porn!") And I've noticed that, over time, my experience of LJ has changed. For example, I'm much less likely to make friends (actual friends, not friends-list friends) now, and when I do, it's as a result of me seeking other people out.
Also, I've been getting strange responses to the comments I leave in other people's LJs lately. Used to be, people just responded. Or not. Whichever. Now - well, I sometimes get responses that indicate major astonishment that I commented on a friend's post at all.
This is weird. Isn't it? It's new to me, anyway, and therefore weird to me.
Admittedly, I'm not the biggest commenter; I don't comment on 99.5% of the posts I read, because I'm just not very social. (People who know me in real life are invited to take 10-15 minutes to laugh helplessly on the floor at that understatement.) But that's always been true, the not commenting and the not socializing. So I'm kind of wondering if the subtext of these new, weird responses is, "Wow. You actually came down from your high horse long enough to leave a comment in my LJ! A very long and pointless comment, let me add, which I'm kind of astonished you thought I'd be interested in." (Because when I do comment, I do it to excess. You should all be very glad I don't comment any more often, actually.) In other words, I'm wondering if my bad LJ habits (lack of comments, spotty replying, a dearth of posts) have made me something of, um, a Notorious B.I.T.C.H. (I'm spelling it! For purposes of delicacy! See? No wankiness here!)
Which, hey, if that's the case, I'm fine with it, actually. (Yet more evidence for bitch-hood, I realize.) But, okay. You know how we are all destined for hell because of all the fun we're having? I suspect I will not be frolicking on level 2 with the rest of you lusty folks, but rather wherever it is they store the excessively curious. (I'll be asking "Why?" in hell, in other words. This is a very suitable fate for me.) I'm okay with my LJ experience changing; I'm still having just as much fun here - more fun than is legal in most states, in fact. But I want to know why it's changed.
So I'm asking you.
But, seriously, this is not a request for you to tell me you love me. (Love doesn't need a season! Or a reason! Or a wankfest!) Instead, I invite you to speculate on why other people don't love me. Or, at any rate, why they seem unwilling to talk to me, and why they sometimes act shocked when I talk to them.
Plus, it's an occasion to post a poll. And is there ever a really bad reason to do that?
[Poll #671603]
And please keep in mind, as you read this and select various boxes of clickiness, that I am not asking why no one loves me. Because, actually, I feel very loved. (Um, yeah, the title of the post and the poll would seem to argue otherwise, but my feeling is: if I'm going to post on a topic of potential wankiness, I might as well make fun of myself. That way, at least it will be amusing. To me, I mean.) LJ has been good to me.
It's just that anniversaries are much on my mind lately. (Best Beloved and I will be celebrating our, um, somethingth year together tomorrow. We still haven't figured out just what number year it is, though.) And my LJ anniversary is coming up, so I've been reflecting on it, in my usual mature, considered manner. ("Hmmm. Two years? Really?" [pause for thought] "Oooo! Porn!") And I've noticed that, over time, my experience of LJ has changed. For example, I'm much less likely to make friends (actual friends, not friends-list friends) now, and when I do, it's as a result of me seeking other people out.
Also, I've been getting strange responses to the comments I leave in other people's LJs lately. Used to be, people just responded. Or not. Whichever. Now - well, I sometimes get responses that indicate major astonishment that I commented on a friend's post at all.
This is weird. Isn't it? It's new to me, anyway, and therefore weird to me.
Admittedly, I'm not the biggest commenter; I don't comment on 99.5% of the posts I read, because I'm just not very social. (People who know me in real life are invited to take 10-15 minutes to laugh helplessly on the floor at that understatement.) But that's always been true, the not commenting and the not socializing. So I'm kind of wondering if the subtext of these new, weird responses is, "Wow. You actually came down from your high horse long enough to leave a comment in my LJ! A very long and pointless comment, let me add, which I'm kind of astonished you thought I'd be interested in." (Because when I do comment, I do it to excess. You should all be very glad I don't comment any more often, actually.) In other words, I'm wondering if my bad LJ habits (lack of comments, spotty replying, a dearth of posts) have made me something of, um, a Notorious B.I.T.C.H. (I'm spelling it! For purposes of delicacy! See? No wankiness here!)
Which, hey, if that's the case, I'm fine with it, actually. (Yet more evidence for bitch-hood, I realize.) But, okay. You know how we are all destined for hell because of all the fun we're having? I suspect I will not be frolicking on level 2 with the rest of you lusty folks, but rather wherever it is they store the excessively curious. (I'll be asking "Why?" in hell, in other words. This is a very suitable fate for me.) I'm okay with my LJ experience changing; I'm still having just as much fun here - more fun than is legal in most states, in fact. But I want to know why it's changed.
So I'm asking you.
But, seriously, this is not a request for you to tell me you love me. (Love doesn't need a season! Or a reason! Or a wankfest!) Instead, I invite you to speculate on why other people don't love me. Or, at any rate, why they seem unwilling to talk to me, and why they sometimes act shocked when I talk to them.
Plus, it's an occasion to post a poll. And is there ever a really bad reason to do that?
[Poll #671603]
no subject
I'm sure that people would love you more if you would rec Doctor Who stories, though. If, you know, you wanted to be proactive. *koff* *koff*
As for my own LJ experience, I went from absolutely hating LJ (but participating because that's where fandom was taking place) to actually mostly enjoying myself now. I still think that it's a crappy model for the kind of community interaction that fans tend to have, but I've made my peace with it. *g*
no subject
If you guys keep saying this stuff, you're going to make me all swelled of head, you know. And then, inevitably, I'll be, say, standing in the so-called "express" line at my credit union, and I'll snap like a twig and shout, "Attention, person attempting to take out a second mortgage at an express teller window: take your vile, express-line abusing habits elsewhere. I am internet famous. I don't have to put with this crap!"
I suspect that would garner me, well, not fame. More like unfortunate noteriety. Plus probably a note in my account calling me Crazy Internet Lady.
I'm sure that people would love you more if you would rec Doctor Who stories, though.
Doctor Who is love, then? Why has no one mentioned this to me before? No one tells me anything.
*sulks*
I still think that it's a crappy model for the kind of community interaction that fans tend to have, but I've made my peace with it.
See, I agree - LJ is not ideal for your average fan, or for fandom as a whole. But I still love it. What makes LJ imperfect for fandom also makes my participation in fandom possible.
*shamelessly benefits from the fannish status quo*
I dread the day when fandom migrates to its next incarnation, I tell you.
no subject
Hi! I'm just going to back her up, here, because Doctor Who IS love.
Okay, so, for me it's mainly about Jack (JACK!), the 51st century former time agent turned conman, best described as "flexible," and a character about whom a story has been written in which he flirts with a potted plant. (I am awaiting Torchwood with baited breath, let me tell you. *G*)