Stalking! We all do it!

Wow, I haven't been writing very much recently. It's not because I don't have anything to say. I do. I have lots to talk about. I just have too much to say, and once I find time to sit in front of the computer, I get overwhelmed. Then I quit and find something else to do.

There are quite a few topics in my head, but let me pick one for now:

Stalking

Sound familiar? We're all guilty of it. Well, not so much stalking but being curiously attracted to someone. Let me give you a few examples:

- Having your friend's friend or that random girl's screenname on your AIM buddylist and checking her away message every day.

- Googling someone and finding out everything you can about them.

- Reading someone's Online Journal every day.

- Checking out someone's Facebook profile every day.

- Reading Away Messages every day.

- Asking other people about your person-of-interest to find out about them, but not really talking to them.

- Doing any other form of research about a person, without that person's knowing.

I could say I am guilty of almost all of the above. The person could be a random person in my class, a friend's friend, a faculty member, a person I hardly know, a celebrity, a person who I see in the computer lab every day but don't know their name, a person I have a crush on, my roommate, my friend's roommates, etc. The person of interest can be anyone.

But why? Why do I feel the need to "stalk" them? Why do I feel the need to know more about them? Why that person? Why not any other person? What makes that person so attractive?

The fun thing about this 'research' about another person is that the other person usually has no idea about this growing interest of them.

For example, I know my friends and family members read my Online Journal. I have the link in my AIM profile. I have the link in my Facebook profile. I am very easily found on the internet. Believe me, I have tried Googling myself, and Bam! there I am! Linda's Online Journal. The thing is: I want people to read my Journal. My friends and family are allowed to read it. That's why it's online .

There are a few people who talk to me about my articles. They tell me that they read it. That makes me feel good. There are other people whom I know read it, but they pretend to be surprised when I make any mention of having a blog. Well, actually, I don't know for sure if they read it, but I am pretty sure they do. That's funny. It's as if people are embarrassed for having interest in someone else's private lives. The funnier thing is: I do the same thing. I have found out the most random things about someone else and pretend to be surprised or innocent if they tell me something about them in person. Perhaps its fun? Perhaps we are embarrassed by ourselves for having so much random interest in a person in the first place?

You can look at my Webserver Stats for my journal. It's a link in the top right-hand corner. The CASE blog provides me this service, and I think it's the coolest program ever invented. I have it for the public to look at because I feel weird for hiding such information from people. I can see:

-exactly how many hits I get per day
-how many visits I get per day (including at which hour they visited)
-how many pages the person has visited
-the person's IP address from where they logged on (including the date, time, hour)
-any google entry the person entered to find me

-and more...

I love looking at the recent IP addresses I get. I hardly know anyone's IP address, except for maybe if it ends in a "yale.edu", I know its my only friend from Yale. There are a whole load of "cwru.edu". There are also a lot of strangers from other universities, and a whole bunch of random IP addresses I can't decipher (and I don't really care to).

I am beginning to forget the whole point of this entry. Oh yeah: so why do people get so interested in a person? Why should I care about Joe-Shmoe?

I don't know. Maybe it's simply because Joe-Shmoe is interesting? Maybe Joe-Shmoe doesn't seem to be the person he appears to be in public? Maybe Joe-Shmoe seems to have a certain connection with you that you would like to pursue? Maybe you just like knowing hidden things about Joe-Shmoe, and Joe-Shmoe just happened to be the person of interest for now? Maybe its the whole game of stalking that makes you slightly guilty, and that guilt gives you a high, which causes you to get obsessed because of that high? (isn't there a medical explanation for this phenomenon? something about dopamine or something?)

Whatever the reason is: we all do it. We just don't acknowledge it :) However, sometimes its fun to take the stalking to the next level, and actually talk to the person. :)