| Oh...where to begin??? After so many weeks (okay, months!) of not writing, I figure I owe everyone an explanation of what I've been doing with my time. The answer is: I've been doing some farm work. Ummm...virtual farm work. Yes, farmville on facebook. I can only hope that my friend Ron will not read this confession *cringes* I can explain...please stay with me for the explanation! Back in October, my son Jonah said, "I've started a farm. I need you to start a farm so you can send me gifts." So the next time I went on facebook, I created a farmtown account. "No, mom, you joined FarmTown. You need to join FarmVille." Okay, I was a novice, but I quickly learned and became hooked. You see, I found there was a certain satisfaction in placing everything exactly where I wanted it to be, and knowing that when I returned, it would be in no other place. Ron wonders at the appeal of "an existential crop" and "two-dimensional penguins," but two-dimensionality is the appeal. Real life is simply not that ordered. I have busted the secret code for Farmville, the psychological inner workings behind it, why it was brought into existence. It was designed for defeated perfectionists. None of it's real so you can have everything as perfect as you want it. For me, Farmville was all about control. Oh yeah...control. Anyway, having a designated amount of time that I allow myself to waste on a daily basis, I invested it in my farm, and that is why I haven't been writing. Now that I am finished with Farmville, I can share my experiences of farming in a most knowledgeable manner. I find that FarmVille closely mirrors real life in many ways. It allows friends to give you gifts that you don't always want...has this ever happened to you? It happened to my parents when I was growing up. I'll never forget the time we were having a yard sale and trying to sell off some junk when, lo and behold, a family friend came by and pointed to some hideous picture that we had obligatorily placed on the wall for many years. "Hey!" he said, taking a step back and looking at it, amid the assortment of clutter, "our family gave you that!" My dad snatched it up quickly and asked, "How did that get out here?" Looking it over, he kept shaking his head in disbelief, pretending to be amazed by its beauty when really, he was just trying to figure out how to escape the uncomfortable situation. Finally, he looked over at me and my sister, pointed at us and announced, "The kids must have put it out here!" Kids are convenient, sometimes. Admit it, if you were in that situation, you'd have done the same thing. The problem with FarmVille is that when your neighbors give you a potted plant, they expect to see it when they come and fertilize your crops and feed your chickens. I ended up with a bunch of stuff that I couldn't delete because of guilt, and then was awarded a "Packrat Award." But even then, I didn't quit. I continued to farm through the Christmas season, when Farmville gave me 19 cats...that was not really a gift, more of a animal regulation violation. I had to take care of the problem the best I could... |
| So after deleting my crops, I left the farm. I can't say that I was a very honest player anyway. My Farmville Secrets: Here is a confession, and now my former farmville neighbors may hate me. When I would find "mystery eggs" in my virtual chicken coop, I would not always click on the option to share them with friends. I clicked "no" because I knew that at some point, one of my friends would click on the option "Hatch Egg," be too late, and get the message: "Sorry! All of April's eggs have been claimed." That sentence made me feel strange, and I just didn't want it out there. So, I didn't share my mystery eggs. Even the phrase "my mystery eggs" sounds odd to me... Many, many, times, I clicked "Ignore" on the lost and lonely animals that wandered onto my farm. I did, however, put a lost and lonely bull that my neighbor found into my dairy barn, and every so often, the animals would virtually reproduce, allowing me to put a calf up for adoption. Sometimes, I ignored these newborn, two-dimensional calves. Whew! I'm starting to feel better...confession really is good for the soul. When you achieve a new level in Farmville, you are given a title such as "Fantastic Farmer" or "Terrific Tiller." If you post these catchy phrases on your profile, your friends can get a bonus. With so many levels and awards, though, it seems that the writers at Farmville were soon depleted of alliterative phrases, and were forced to start rhyming everything. The last award I was given was called "The Need for Seed." Why, oh why???? Again, I did not post this information...but you probably already guessed that, right? Maybe I just wasn't cut out for life on the farm. Here is a last look at my farm, as it was when I left it. |
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