I got Farked.

My column this week got Farked. Fear not, being Farked is actually a good thing.

Fark.com is a web site that aggregates all sorts of weird or interesting or funny news articles from around the web. Now, I would hardly categorize "Suburban Fringe" as news, but since it does appear on a news site, I guess it qualified. Someone - no idea who, because I have no idea how articles are selected for inclusion on Fark - chose to include a link to this week's column about Bluetooth earpieces and the people who abuse them.

But see, that's only half the story. The cool part is that the column topic sparked a huge conversation among the Farkers. Farkers are the people who read Fark every day and discuss the news stories aggregated there. Apparently, a lot of Farkers are just as sick of "Bluetools" as I am. (In some cases, hilariously so.) Other Farkers were just as adamant about their right to wear their earpieces wherever they go, whenever they want. The end result was a 600-post-long conversation. At times it devolved into an argument, but most of the posts (the ones I read, anyway) were at least civil, and most were clever.

The best part, as far as I'm concerned, was that the online conversation offered folks who have never heard of the Fringe to read it, hate it, and then tell the world about how much they hate it. That's right, it was a gold mine of my beloved hate mail.

Here's a few of my favorite insults:

There are a few editorial writers in the world who can carry off an article like this without sounding like banal, cliche, less interesting and much paler copies of Andy Rooney. I'm sorry to say that Bob Rybarczyk is not one of them.

Did we really need an article to tell us something so obvious?

Oh, the humanity, people don't things that I don't do! They must be stopped!

That sure is one insecure, cranky old columnist. Times change, gramps. We don't wear onions on our belts, either.It seems the d*****baggery is in the source, not the subject.

The writer is the dumba** tool here. I'll never wear a bluetooth, but I don't give a fark about how he thinks people are supposed to be walking through a grocery aisle. Maybe if the writer wasn't such a pansy trying to look at everybody else around him like a creepy a** lame wad, he'd enjoy his life a little more. And then he writes a column about it? What a whiner.

Welcome to the 21st century. you'll get over it.

Oh no! Someone I don't even know is wearing something that for no reason at all annoys me, and they have just passed into my field of vision. Obviously I have no choice but to stare at them, and think about it for hours and hours until it eats away at me making me a bitter old shell of a human being! If only I could just turn my head slightly and look away at something... at anything else! Oh the Humanity!!!

I realize this guy getting paid to write this crap shouldn't annoy me, but it does.

Ahh a Bob Rybarczyk blog post made fark. We here in St. Louis we are not sure why this hairless ape with an internet connection still has a job. The amount of suck and smug jacka** is about equal in all of his 'articles.' He really takes the idea that journalists are nothing more then glorified bloggers to a whole new level. His posts are only funny to those who thought Everybody Loves Raymond was good TV.

Attention St. Louis Today writer - this article is 3-4 years behind the times!

That tool that wrote the article is the oldest, smelliest fart of all.

It is not impolite to display a tool that others do not happen to have a use for. It *is* impolite to treat the world as your personal space and get annoyed at others for intruding on it. Another much-ado-about-nothing spacefiller column.

Ignore the column writer. He obviously has a brain tumor from using his cell phone without a bluetooth headset.

Jeebus, who farking cares? I use a bluetooth for driving only but the author sounds more like a whiny d*****bag than the woman who was minding her own business.

Biting social commentary is even better 2 years after everybody else made it.

"Bob Rybarczyk": say that three times real fast, without stuttering.

Dear Mr Rybarczyk: REAL men don't say "Thingies"

This guy gets the award for the most sand in a columnist's vagina. Headsets are annoying but this guy needs therapy for his issues with flashing blue lights.

Bob's rather the doosh, isn't he? Makes me just want to run right out and get his upcoming book. *pfffttt*

whatever dude, i think something should stand up and tell you to stfu. you live in st.louis, nobody cares what you have to say. the only douches are those still using wired headsets.

I'm sure there were more insults in there, but geez, it takes forever to read 600+ comments, and I didn't have time or energy to read them all. And of course a few people mentioned that they thought the column was funny, but eh, I enjoy those by myself and don't really need to repeat them here. But I do appreciate knowing that at least a few folks enjoyed the column.

I also dug that a few of the commenters were appreciative of the Iron Shiek reference I snuck into the column this week. Made it all worth it.

I've now been Farked twice. Here's hoping it happens a third time someday.

And, hey, I liked "Everybody Loves Raymond." Sure, it was a little dorky, but it was funny.

Here's a link to the entire Fark-versation, if you have a lot of time to kill.