In Common with Humans

I guess I am effectively banished from Facebook. 🙁

I can’t log in, or when I can log in briefly, I can’t post or do anything. After much digging in Facebook “help” (they don’t make it easy to find, and it’s no mystery why) I found a way to send a message to Facebook “support.” I got a robo-response, and that’s all I ever expect to get.

I can’t delete my own account, because you can’t delete yourself from Facebook. You can “deactivate” your account and you can request to be removed, but you have to be able to log in to do either one. I can’t open a new Facebook account, because that is strictly against Facebook’s ToS. I’m stuck with a Facebook account that I can’t use. I’m still getting e-mail notifications when other people comment on my updates or send me messages, but I can’t reply to them.

I suppose I was wasting too much time on it, anyway. I’ve been consoling myself by updating By Light Unseen Media’s MySpace page (where my Tweets echo just fine, thanks to an embedded widget–my tweets also echo in the sidebar of my author blog, which is hosted on my own domain). I guess I’ll just have to wait for Google Wave to take over the Internet.

Have I mentioned lately how much I hate Facebook? Like, seriously hate them. *sigh*

My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 14:49 I’m having the worst time w/ Facebook behaving very erratically. I can’t log in, or I log in & can’t see my own updates, or can’t post. #
• 14:58 I’ve tried clearing everything in the browser–cache, history, cookies, etc–did a disk cleanup, rebooted, tried different browser, nada #
• 15:13 @jarien I’d blame FB but everyone’s updating away w/o complaint. I don’t use apps. Wondering if I have malware/trojan or maybe firewall prob #
• 17:05 @diduval That’s correct. I did not. #
• 19:34 I’m going to be interviewed for the Lowell Sun newspaper next Wednesday! #
• 20:30 First fire of the season tonight! The cordwood I ordered hasn’t been delivered yet, but I have a small stack of logs from the ice storm. #

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*sigh* Have I mentioned lately just how MUCH I hate Facebook? The feeling is obviously mutual. Since I got back from Albacon, Facebook has been giving me endless trouble. It won’t let me log in, saying my account is “temporarily unavailable due to system maintenance.” Or, it lets me log in, but won’t let me post any updates or comments, and won’t echo Tweets. Or, it lets me log in and do something, then a few minutes later if I try to make a post, says, “you have to be logged in to do that.” When I go to the Facebook log-in home page, my e-mail address doesn’t appear in the little box as it normally does. I tried accessing Facebook in Firefox and got exactly the same results (while Firefox went and got updates for itself and told me I HAD to upgrade Flash Player RIGHT AWAY), so it’s not MSIE. Concurrently with this issue, I’d also noticed that the big Dell was running very sluggishly in general, even for things that didn’t utilize the ‘Net a lot like MS Word (but Word can access the ‘Net, for example, for online help or getting libraries of clip art, so the Internet connection affects it). Even more suspiciously, I suddenly couldn’t play streaming video clips without their halting every ten seconds to buffer, like I was on dial-up or something.

After wrestling with all this for several days, today I:

• cleared the browser cache, history, cookies and everything–stripped it bare, didn’t save any passwords or favorite sites or anything at all;
• updated Flash Player;
• ran several diagnostic and fix-it apps for the hard drive, which is getting full (the computer is three years old);
• finally thought to reset the modem and wireless router, which I hadn’t done for a while.

All of this tremendously improved the performance of the computer and solved the streaming video problem. But Facebook is being just as difficult as ever. For a short time tonight I was able to post to Facebook from my netbook, Pigwidgeon, but that didn’t last long. After I’d made a few comments and updates–and it still wouldn’t echo Tweets–I got the “you must be logged in to do that” error again, logged out, tried to log in and was denied. And since I can’t log in, I can’t contact Facebook support! It doesn’t seem to be a generalized problem because other people are updating merrily away and I haven’t seen any complaints in other venues about Facebook. A few people say they’ve had trouble with “apps” but I never use any apps on Facebook.

This is very aggravating because I’ve been connecting with so many people on Facebook exclusively. Hardly anyone reads LJ anymore and Twitter is a sea of marketing and self-promotional messages. I just friended my nephew on Facebook! Gods, but I hate Facebook. There’s nothing worse than a service that makes itself indispensible and then dispenses with you! *grump*

My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 12:42 Tried something different w/ veggies, made it up as I went & ended up w/ vegetable-cheese soup. Full of win but taking forever to cool! #
• 13:15 @diduval Yes, I did. #
• 15:01 Just got Breaking Dawn on unabridged audiobook at library, serves 3 purposes: read book, study narrator technique & audio for workouts 🙂 #
• 15:38 Great discussion from NAIBA conference, “do we need a new book category for ‘tween’ readers?” is.gd/4jEv9 (Shelf Awareness) #
• 01:03 John Oakes: publishing industry isn’t “dying,” it’s already (un)dead is.gd/4keWR (Huff. Post) #
• 01:34 Some people are getting huffy about this piece, I think he makes some interesting points: vampires=gay men in media? is.gd/4khdB #

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My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 20:57 This is the 2nd day in a row I’ve been shut out of Facebook all afternoon for alleged “site maintenance.” It’s getting very old. :-p #
• 21:49 @jarien It can’t be my browser, because FB comes back by itself, and w/ lots fewer flist updates than usual. They’re changing things on FB #

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My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 12:38 Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends in Canada! #
• 13:04 I had a *fantastic* time at Albacon! Best convention, overall, of the entire year! I’m absolutely *wiped out.* But in a good way. 🙂 #
• 15:10 Authors: don’t expect a publisher to believe you can write if you act like you can’t read. Submission guidelines exist for a reason! #
• 16:19 Beg. Nov. 1, Oklahoma will publicly post all information about every abortion performed in state: is.gd/4fRUU (Air America) #
• 01:09 Hi-lite May 22nd on your calendar: Schwarzenegger Signs Bill Creating Harvey Milk Day. is.gd/4gw1x (NPR) #

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Happy Thanksgiving!

My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 11:01 New journal entry, “Join us on Coming Out Day! vyrdolak1998.livejournal.com/194059.html #

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To celebrate Coming Out Day, members of the Outer Alliance are posting stories or excerpts on this theme on their blogs. Here is an excerpt from my forthcoming novel, The Longer the Fall. This scene is set in the year 1954.

As they were passing Camden Hills State Park, Moira said, a little too casually, “There was one more thing…that I wanted to ask you. I’m just kind of curious.”

“You know the rules, if I can’t answer, I won’t. Nothing personal.”

“Actually, this is…pretty personal. I mean, it’s not about your group, or Mr. Morgan.”

Diana would have given Moira a curious look at this, but she had discovered that taking her eyes off the road was most inadvisable. “Go ahead.”

“Okay…um. So. With all the…experience that you’ve had…have you ever been with another girl?”

“Sure.” The white line on the road seemed to be a little too close to the car, and Diana leaned forward, peering.

“More than one?”

“You mean at the same time?” She slowed down and let the car drift a bit to the right—yes, that seemed better. I should have had another cup of coffee…Thomas would never forgive her if she killed herself in a car crash, so close to the end of their working.

Moira sounded a bit flustered. “I didn’t mean…I wasn’t talking about your, your Beltene things…”

“I wasn’t, either.” They were coming into Pepperell now, meaning there were street lights and mailboxes and sidewalks and many other helpful guideposts to assist in staying in the right lane. Diana relaxed with a sense of relief. She turned off of Main Street and very carefully drove the two short blocks to the duplex where Moira rented an apartment, and braked a little hard, bringing the car to a sudden stop. “Oops, sorry,” she said as Moira caught herself on the dashboard with both hands. “What are we talking about, Moira? If you want to know everything I’ve done, in bed and out, I’ll tell you! But we’ll be here all night.”

Moira stared at her for a moment, and she smiled weakly. “Nothing, I just…nothing. Thanks for dinner, that was sweet of you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Shaking her head, which was a mistake, Diana took the back way to School Street. She opened the driver’s window all the way to let the reviving chilly night air blow onto her face. Her thoughts alternated between focusing intently on the road, and meandering with some puzzlement over Moira’s questions. Just as she pulled up to the granite boulder and was about to make the turn, the shoe finally dropped. She sat in the idling car, staring blankly at the speedometer and wondering just how much of her brains had ended up in her sinuses, after all, and whether she should go back to Moira’s house and talk to her some more. She had absolutely no idea what she would say, however. When she heard Thomas’ amused voice just outside the car window, she jumped so badly, she lost contact with the clutch and the engine stalled.

(c) 2009 Inanna Arthen

My tweets from yesterday for non-Twitterers:

• 00:56 Really busy day at Albacon! I danced in public for the first time in YEARS! World Building & Business panels went well. #albacon #

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