Now I Want a Farm

Normally, whenever Elder Brother is mentioned, it is in glowing terms of praise, admiration and gratitude. Not today.

Allow me to set the scene.

I do not play games on Facebook. This is a rule as solid and immutable as "Thou shalt not kill" or "Joey doesn't share food." I am on Facebook strictly to keep an aunt's eye on my lamb and The Flash. The added benefit of spying on hoards of people I haven't seen in years is just gravy. Or annoying. It depends on the day.

I've been invited to play games, but I have politely and, sometimes not so politely, declined. I've seen the awards for Mob World and Fairyland and Zoomanics (I changed the names because I don't know the real ones). I've been hit with snowballs and chocolate snowballs and never retaliated. I've received animals as gifts and done my darnedest to deactivate them so they don't die from neglect. I've been poked and tagged without permission. To be fair, I have retaliated with that because doing so doesn't require me to "allow access" to my information.

I've listened to Elder Brother discuss his admiralty status in Starfleet. He's moving up in the Universe and quite happy about it. I have no desire to make myself a target in space. I have remained blissfully game-free.

This week, while waiting for the nieces to appear, Elder Brother gave me a tour of his Farmville Farm.

I want one.

Seeing his cluttered yet organized mass of fruit trees, crops, dairy buildings, wandering cats and pigs and reindeer, lakes, sheds and hay bales made my covetous gland swell up and excrete. He showed me other people's farms. The Flash has an entire field of sunflowers. One person has a carousel. Lots of folks have herds of elephants. I don't want elephants, but I do want a farm.

You can move things around wherever you want them. You can buy things and sell things. Things show up but you don't have to keep them if you don't want them. And nothing dies if you neglect it. It just waits expectantly for you to come pay attention to it. I can do that. I've had the same AI fish screen saver for eight years, and it can die if I don't care for it. (It's gross, too. The dead, bloated body floats at the top of the computer screen waiting for you to reset. I knew someone else who didn't care so much. It was very sad).

Rain storms and tornadoes don't visit Farmville. Whatever you plant is guaranteed to grow and sell for full market value. Entire crops mature in hours or days so it's almost instant gratification. And the only farmer avatar available is skinny. It's like Heaven.

I want to plant groves of colorful fruit trees. And have dairy buildings surrounded by bright flowers. And a flock of swans or ducks on a "serene pool." And angora rabbits that produce fur. And pigs that hunt truffles. And crops of purple eggplants and yellow sunflowers and green avacados. And pink cows that produce strawberry milk. It's like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, except it's not fattening.

I Want A Farm!

I don't care that my computer doesn't have the memory capacity to support a farm. Elder Brother was quite clear about that.

I Want A Farm!

And now I have one. Come be my neighbor. "I'll fertilize your crops," she sing-songs.

And I have Elder Brother to blame. So feel blamed, Elder Brother. You did this to me.

Oh, and I'm going to need a bigger monitor after all. I can't see my whole farm on this one.