Facebook

I've been in Facebook. No, I haven't been hiding there. I haven't been avoiding this blog by letting myself drift aimlessly in status notification of people I've lost touch with ( but wish to keep a connection to . . .) Anyway, I'm not even talking about being online.

In Facebook, they have a huge open area with desks, each of which has a ginormous computer monitor. Most desks have a person looking at a black screen with cryptic green letters. Some desks also have rocking pandas (like rocking horses) and skateboarding ostriches.

The ostrich, by the way, was skateboarding on . . . I think it's called a casterboard. We found a bunch lying around one night, and they were there for everyone to use, so we tried them out in the hall. A friendly coder person took a minute to show us how it's done: "Put one foot on . . . no! you have it the wrong way! . . . ok try again . . . now balance your foot . . . push off . . . don't worry, you could only die . . ." And then I'm like " stay on stay on stay on FALL!" Over in another corner of the building, the ostrich was balancing perfectly.

When you live in the bay area and know comp sci people, you are likely to have a friend, or friend of a friend, who works at Google or Facebook or Microsoft (although that's more in Seattle) . . . anyway, in one of those places. Which is how I have a Facebook friend.

It turns out that she, and a good portion of the people who work there, are currently crazy for ping pong. Or, actually, a variant they call Volley Pong, which is suitably zany for the place. It's kinda like Volleyball played with a ping pong ball and paddles, although the rules seem to evolve based on who's playing. And it is played into the night- I left at 10:30 one night, and they were only picking up steam! More and more people joined us, I guess because they were finishing up their work for the night.

From my perspective, though, the most important aspect of the place is the free food. They have a fridge full of Frappuccinos. And a cafeteria which makes delicious delicious food that my friend can bring guests to. And those guests get steak and ice cream, and are very full afterwards.

So that was my journey into Facebook, which is where Facebook comes from.