LoserSpace

In the world of online social networking, I have made facebook my home. In fact, I have ignored most of my friends' pleas for me to join MySpace out of sheer principle - everyone is on it, and I just don't like the way it looks. And even though the library world is all "a-buzz" about social networking and using it to reach customers, I have just never been able to bring myself to join it - even for work! But yesterday, I broke my rule and joined MySpace. But why? Why would I do such a treacherous thing? Well - it's for color guard.

Let me explain. First of all, I was in color guard all through high school, and most of college. I love it, and I really mean love it - so much so that I have been almost depressed about possibly never performing or assisting with another guard ever again. It was my life for about 9 years, and... I miss it. A lot. Anyhow, I was reading a local newspaper yesterday, and on the front page was a picture of some guys spinning flags. My heart jumped a little, and I read the article associated with it - apparently, there are two color guards in Columbus that are designed for adults who want to spin again: Flaggots, which is an all-gay men group, and Spin Columbus, which is for anyone who wants to join. That means me! ME! I went to their website, and it sounds great - but they don't have an email server set up yet, so the only way to get in touch with them is - you guessed it - through MySpace.

Fucking hell!

I actually had to talk to Jared to make sure he wouldn't break up with me if I joined MySpace for the sole purpose of messaging Spin Columbus. Of course he wouldn't (I think), but still - I really, really didn't want to join. But I also really, really want to spin. Such is life, I guess.

So I joined. (Don't hate me?) But please don't try to add me as your friend if you're on there - I'm deleting it as soon as possible.

Let me just say, the website sucks. It's full of large, annoying ads, and it's not very easy to navigate. I signed up and had to verify my email address - but once I did, it still said on my profile that I had to verify my email address. For the verification to register, I had to logout and log back in again. (It sure would have been nice to be prompted to do so.) So then I searched for Spin Columbus, and sent them a message. I also requested to add them as a friend. I felt dirty about the whole thing, but at least I was able to contact them, right?

Well, today I tried to log in to MySpace and found that my password wasn't working. I knew that I was putting in the right one (I even checked my confirmation email to be sure), but I figured I'd go through the "Forgot your password?" thing anyhow just to be thorough. However, I was told that my email did not match any registered email addresses. What?! But I registered yesterday and even sent a message to another member! How can my account just not exist anymore? Shit, I didn't even get to upload a picture! So I had to go through the whole process again today and send another message to Spin Columbus. I don't even know if the first message I sent went through - and if it did, they wouldn't have been able to respond to me anyhow. I even signed up with the same email address, password, and url as yesterday, as if I had never even joined in the first place. Perhaps it was all just a bad dream?

The weird part is, when I went to MySpace today to login (before discovering that my account didn't exist anymore), it said on the main page, "Hello, Erica" - but how could it have known who I was if my account was deleted? For shame, MySpace. I hate you even more than I already did. And apparently, you hate me just as much back.

Hopefully I will hear something from Spin Columbus, and this whole ordeal will be worth the effort. And then, I will truly enjoy deleting my account.