Okay, time *sigh* to remove friends.

[icarus]

I'm about as good at deleting people who've unfriended me as I am about throwing out old photos and letters from old lovers. That is to say, I'd prefer not to do it at all.

No matter what our disputes or how our interests have diverged, I still remember you fondly, if (in some cases) rather faintly. If we've disagreed I still probably respect you.

I have in my LJ career only unfriended a handful of people, one of whom I friended back less than a year later. Of the remaining two, one was a personal "unfriending me? Well, then -- so there. Pbblt." The other was a more general swearing-in-capslock irritation.

I hate unfriending.

But recently I haven't been able to friend people back.

LJ places a limit on the number of people you can friend. Thanks to prillalar and vermillion_moon's helpfulness, I'm now scanning the ever-depressing Joule and marking the bodies with yellow tags.

If I unfriend you and you don't want to be unfriended (I can't imagine why) just let me know. I'm assuming all of these who've removed me are gone for good.

*goes back to sorting old photos, feeling rather discouraged, but dutiful. There are new people to add after all.*

ETA: What I have learned -

1 - There are a lot of deleted journals in this world (and on my friendslist)
2 - What the hell did I say on January 13th? Because a whole lot of Stargate people friended me, and a hell of a lot of HP people dropped me
3 - That I still hate unfriending

Comments

[shocolate.livejournal.com]

I don't get the Joule thing - there is no way that all those things happened on teh day they say they did - especially today - my friends aren't even awake yet, yet they are friending and unfriending like bunnies shagging!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oooh. Curiouser and curiouser.

I wonder of Joule caches and then posts the date once its reached a certain critical mass.

Icarus

[lyricalnights.livejournal.com]

It shows you all the friending/unfriending action since the last time you (or someone else using your LJ name) checked the site.

[skuf.livejournal.com]

When you check Joule (or someone else checks your Joule!), it records everyone who has friended/defriended you since last you (or someone else!) checked.

[shocolate.livejournal.com]

So I can check someone else's every few days and then when they check it it'll drive them crazy?

Excellent!

[skuf.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's called Joule-stalking - people have complained about it before (dorrie6, for example) :o)

[shocolate.livejournal.com]

Oh.

I wasn't really going to - honest, Your Honour!

*looks innocent*

[skuf.livejournal.com]

What the hell did I say on January 13th?
As I said above, your Joule simple hadn't been checked since November 20th, which is a long time indeed, so you're look at everyone who friended/defriended you November 20th-January 13th.

I had written out a whole thing about my views on friending, but it's nothing I haven't said 10 times before, and it gets me all depressed, so I deleted it again :o)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

*eyes cross* I still don't get it. Because Joule gives specific dates for those who've friended/unfriended you, so obviously they're not caching and appearing on a particular date.

??

Icarus

[skuf.livejournal.com]

Because Joule gives specific dates for those who've friended/unfriended you
The dates are when someone has checked your Joule page - either you, or someone who was curious about your friending/defriending stats.

It's kind of like:

You vacuum under your couch. 1 month later you look, and it's full of dust-bunnies under there! But they didn't just arrive the minute you looked - they've been slowly accumulating, yeah? But if you were keeping a journal, it'd be, "December 13th. Looked under couch. OMG, dust-bunnies galore!". But they were there before December 13th. Except for the ones that just happened to form that day.

All right, stop pushing, I'm taking my analogy to bed now.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oooooh, I get it. That's hilarous that anyone would give a damn.

Icarus

[wired-lizard.livejournal.com]

*feels worthy*

Joule's working again? It seemed not to be for a while...

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

You are always worthy. *nods*

Icarus

[jaig.livejournal.com]

I remember you going on about the Stargate fandom. And er.

Unfriending's like cleaning out your closet. You really like that dirty sweater from a billion years ago, but you don't have any more room, you can't get a bigger closet, and you've got five new shiny sweaters you like.

Um.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I figured I must have posted some sort of Stargate Manifesto that day. *snorts*

But I still show up for the hp_dungeons weekly chats, and I still correspond with Harry Potter writers and reviewers. I've just needed to let my HP batteries recharge. There's no way I wanted to force it and inflict a lot of shallow HP stories on the fandom. Quality to me means depth. You may not be the world's greatest author, but there are layers and complexities to your characters and secondarily, there are compelling and complex plots.

I should probably explain this, shouldn't I?

Icarus

[tjstein.livejournal.com]

I think you just did. Being of the HP-centric ilk that's just skulking about for more of that...I'm waiting patiently for the Primer sequel. Oh and if I ever get around to actually seeing some Stargate, I may fall down that slippery slope too.

Oh and you're still doing the RPG thingy? I'd thought you'd called it quits a while back so I stopped following it. Perhaps I need to check it out again...

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

There's a storyline coming up at the beginning of March that I'm participating in. (It was irresistible.)

Icarus

[celestialseason.livejournal.com]

yeah!
I miss Percy and Niko.

[jaig.livejournal.com]

Not really. There's always something in a story I like, that certain bit of detail, whether it's in a nervous tic or a habit, or the way the classroom's described. It makes the whole story richer. It's also the same with the plot. It's not just some road where BAM, you see the ending after reading the first paragraph.

[venivincere]

*puppy eyes* Pleaaaaase keep me?

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

You're mine. Mine, mine, mine. I don't like to give up my friends.

At this point I'm just deleting those who've unfriended me.

Icarus

[kijikun.livejournal.com]

Hope you keep me, I enjoy reading your thoughts on a great many things.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oh heck, Kiji, why would I ever delete you?

I'm just unfriending... well, actually it's working out that I have a lot of deleted journals on my friendslist. A lot.

Other than that, I am only deleting those who've deleted me, and only enough to make room for the new guys.

Icarus

[boomingvoice.livejournal.com]

er. I enjoy reading your Buddhist stuff, so I'd like to stick around, if I may?

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm not deleting anyone who hasn't deleted me. Period. I've just for the most part never unfriended anyone, even if they've disappeared. This means that I have 150 more journals friended then people who've friended me.

So if I unfriend all those who've deleted their accounts (that seems about 2/3s of these) and who've dropped me... that's 150 friends before I have to start working out strategies on how to keep people friended.

Icarus

[amalthia]

Please don't unfriend me, I really love reading your journal. :) Even though I don't really read your fan fiction too often...weird I know since I friended you to get updates on your fan fiction. But anyway, I think you are an interesting person. :)

I'm also glad you are encouraging the good HP authors to switch over to Stargate, the fandom really does need some new people. :) Hell I even wrote a stargate fan fic...it's still in the beta reading process.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Yay! More Stargate! *bounces*

It's perfectly possible to write more than one fandom. Really. You don't have to switch -- just write both.

Not only am I not unfriending you, I think I just friended you recently. I'm only unfriending a) dead journals and b) those who've unfriended me.

Not to worry. I'm assuming those who've unfriended me aren't interested in reading my journal.

Icarus

[amalthia]

After I wrote my message I checked your info out, yikes you have a lot of friends/friend of.....yeah you really probably do need to do some spring cleaning.

I don't plan on quitting any fandom. :)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I wrote several popular Harry Potter stories one after another, then ran a series of contests (the Democratic Fic Recs and the Duelling Fics), and then the Percy-fest ficathon with a lot of recs. During that period my friendslist doubled and tripled.

Icarus

[amalthia]

How do you find time to write when you are running all these lists/activities???/fests? :)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how I did it (I lived on the internet, that's for sure!). But I certainly can't do it now. But, you won't believe how many stories I wrote.

I just decided to count them. There are 98 stories written between October 2002 and now. Now 50 of those were drabbles, but that's still a lot.

Icarus

[amalthia]

that's a lot, I think I only have about 10 stories of my own, though they are each kind of longish....but yeah I'm also having a hard time finding time to write now that I have a full time job. One one hand it's great, I'm able to pay the bills but on the other I have to ration my time online. :(

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it was really out of control for a while there. I had to cut back my online time, because it was really taking over, and it started getting harder and harder to find time to write -- especially when I was working full time. It was very frustrating. Sometimes I'd stay late at the office to write, just because by the time I got home I'd be too tired.

Icarus

[amalthia]

I played this online game that had me addicted for about a year, I don't think i wrote anything during that time. So now I'm kind of glad the game creators kept changing the game until I no longer enjoyed playing it anymore. :)

though as soon as I stopped playing I got a real job....sigh oh well to really write, I'd have to get rid of my internet connection. It takes more discipline than I have to split my time between emailing friends and writing.

[thereallyle.livejournal.com]

What is Joule and how can I look at it? You've inspired me to unfriend some empty journals, some people I friended when I was manic (and have no idea why), and such. There are a few people where I'm not sure if they unfriended me, or if they just never friended me in the first place.