Holy 100 grand hits Batman!

When the three of us started this blog to occupy a tiny blip-sized island in the vast limitless ocean that is the internet, our intent was to mostly write anything that came to our minds. The very first few posts on the blog were incredibly random (cats , heavy duty medical ethics, food recipes) but over time life happened and people began to move on. We are at a point now when I am the only one left but even then, my output has been dismally low in the last year and a half.

No matter though. Seems like the internet did not forget this humble little corner. Slowly and steadily (like that stupid tortoise from that stupid fable - God I hated that boring tale) the visitors kept coming, mainly to the post about hallucinations and ping-pong balls (here let me do some more gratuitous plugging and link you there), a post I wrote up mostly out of sheer boredom and desire to be wacky.

The blog stat counter officially crossed the 100,000 mark today. Now when you consider that even sites at the low end of the popularity spectrum still get hits in the several thousands every day, this number is nothing. But I think for a venture that grew out of some idle chit-chat three years ago it's more than what I (or the other two contributors, if they are still reading this) could have expected. I will be partying like a freshman at his first frat party tonight, that's for sure. This is an occasion for a bacchanalian revelry of epic proportions.

So keep checking in every now and then because the mission here at UG has been, and will always be, sacrificing our well-being for your entertainment. I promise you that when I bike back home today with the wind rushing pleasantly into my face, a day's worth of mouse brain work behind me, I will think of nothing but that (actually I will be thinking of eating dinner, but hey your entertainment will still be on my list. Somewhere). 

Facebook friendship pages do more good than harm

Unless you have been living in a cave or have been hibernating, you know by know that uber-network Facebook introduced a new feature called friendship page. Since it is possible that you may have been living in a cave, I will grudgingly describe what this feature is.

It allows users to track their friendship back in time by collecting all wall posts, comments, pictures they shared with their friends in one convenient spot. For example, say I want to explore how Citizen Lafayette and I got started. I would go to his profile page, and click on "Citizen and you". This will take me to a page with a picture of both of us (facebook chooses this picture) that supposedly symbolizes our friendship. On this page, I can see all our wall-to-wall, pictures we are tagged in together, events we have attended together, and status comments we have made on each others' profiles.

Pretty nifty, right? I think so. I like it especially because I met a lot of my close friends in my freshman year. So it is very exciting (and a bit cringe-inducing, to be honest) to go back in time and see some of the very initial posts we made to get to know each other better.

Of course, this can also make facebook stalking a lot lot easier (and perhaps also give it official approval) because now you can track the friendships of other people. Curious how Sally ended up with a guy like Bill? Click away and you will know how klutzy Bill wooed Sally!

But I am a pretty utilitarian guy, and facebook friendship clearly adds more good to the society than bad. And for that, I am proud to affix the OFFICIAL UG SEAL OF APPROVAL on facebook friendship pages. From now on, we will sporadically approve products/concepts we clearly like.