this story is probably too long, so stop reading now.

i’m at work yesterday. actually i’m at home today, but i’m writing in the present tense about yesterday which makes no sense but i always write in present tense and i don’t use capital letters because it’s fascist and it doesn’t matter anyhow because you stopped reading a paragraph ago.

anyhow, i’m at work. i might have mentioned that already. it’s an average day. we’re trying to get a co-worker drunk enough to impersonate justin beebee on the last day of work, but he’s young and holds his liquor impressively well. i’m editing stories, and there are only so many first references you can remove from a story, so i take a break to peek at facebook.

except.

we are on the last day of the verizon month,  and we’re at 5.99999999999999999999999999 gigs of a 6 gig plan. if i use the internet at all, we’ll go over just by 15 seconds for the month, costing me $15 that could be better spent on jell-o shots for the co-worker on his way to impersonating carmen miranda. it’s his right. i have a brilliant idea. use the work computer for facebook instead.

except.

i have no idea what my email address is for the current account. in an effort to stay a step ahead of the federales, i have several accounts with varying degrees of legality. i also have about 200 email accounts from the days i would stage hijinks on an unnamed running community, so it’s semi-impossible to know which one to use. so i try one that i think i might have used to create the current account.

it works. it’s my email address, the same password i use for everything (i shouldn’t reveal that, but you stopped reading after the first graf, so i guess it’s ok.)

except.

i’m in the facebook account of a guy named bill collins. i totally freak out.

it’s blank except for his name. has someone created an account using my email account? am i now the mirror account for someone bootlegging spongebob videos from malaysia? i am not a technology genius, so i don’t know what it could be used for. but there it is. there seems to have been no activity, other than a couple of suggested friends, none of which appear to be drug runners or republicans. whew. and then it hits me.

HE KNOWS MY PASSWORD!!!

not only did he use my email address; he used my password. this can’t be good.

what to do? i consider writing the fb tech guys, but it’s going to sound dumb, given that the account is empty. does this happen a lot? is this part of some global scheme? am i unknowingly harboring the rest of those missing hillary emails? can the co-worker do a passable impression of spongebob? a little spongebob always helps in times of tension.

i google “bill collins facebook scam” and get nothing. i google “cat adopts baby monkey.” that helps, but i can’t stop worrying. eventually i go back to editing and forget about it.

at the end of the shift, i open it again and stare. no activity. no photos. no links. what the hell?

and then i realize who the culprit is. it’s me.

during a long-ago quest for the perfect anonymous facebook id, i had thought about using a totally bland name to fly under the radar. that name being bill collins. i set up the account, lost interest and moved on, leaving behind an unused account and a nagging sorrow that fonzie is now on a road trip with james kirk. it’s been sitting there abandoned since.

i guess i’m relieved, but now i want to know more about bill collins. maybe we can become facebook friends. maybe co-worker can do a bill collins impression if we keep the bar tab open long enough. aren’t you glad you didn’t read this now? fascist.

life is funny …