IRREVERENT News

PORTLAND - Local part-time vet-assistant Valarie Newcome today questioned how close she really was to her 832 friends on Facebook.

"I look at all these names and I don't recognize like 90% of them," said Newcome, who registered with the popular social-networking site in 2009. "Like this guy, Blake Hollender. I knew a Blake once, Blake Flan-something, but not Hollender. I don't think I ever knew a Hollender. So like why am I friends with this guy? Is he a stalker or something? Maybe he's related to Holly, I can't remember. Was her brother 'Blake'?"

Newcome admits to accepting all the friend requests herself, but is now questioning why she did it. "It was cool having all these people to talk with, but I really don't know most of them, not well anyway," she admits. "It's like I meet someone in Starbucks and next thing I know I've got a friend request on my phone. I guess I don't have to accept it, but wouldn't that be rude?"

Newcome has also noticed another strange trend among her friends, where every week a certain percentage of them disappear from her friend list. "I guess they're just un-friending me, but I don't know why," she said. "But I get so many new requests, it seems to stay even, right around 830 or so," she notes. "I guess that's my facebook equilibrium or something."

As her friends list has grown, however, so has the time she needs to sort through all the status updates and information flowing from so many people. "Some days it's crazy," she said. "I easily kill an hour or two just facebooking, usually in Starbucks or at the gym. Then I could go a week with just everyone uploading stupid pictures of unknown people and commenting on stuff I don't even know what they're saying."

Nevertheless, Newcome is reflective over a chai latte. "There are way worse things than having a bunch of unknown Facebook friends," she said, "like NOT having a bunch of Facebook friends. That would totally suck."

Credit: Matthew Bowden