IT is one of the most chilling of children’s tales.

A man tortured by ghoulish apparitions from his past. In the Christmas Carol, ghosts of past, present and future rub the main character’s nose in his mistakes, women loved and lost, errors of youth and the like.

The working conditions of the undead must have improved tremendously since the arrival of social networking sites.

The trio of “things that go bump in the night” would nowadays have just set up a Facebook account and got exactly the same effect.

I need a cull. My number of friends is resting at just under 200 at the moment – I don’t need that many.

They won’t all be going. I appreciate the opportunity to keep in touch with old friends, people I’ve just met, pals from holidays; I even like keeping an affectionate eye on the activities of those from my past with whom I may have shared a few happy hours.

However, I resent being collected; tagged by people I once met at a party and barely spoke to.

When I first dipped my toe into the murky cyber world, I got friend requests from all manner of people I didn’t know. Concerned about offending. a bosom buddy by admitting I had completely forgotten them, I was accepting people willy nilly with no screening.

It quickly became apparent that some needy characters were desperate to have as many “friends” as possible.

Yet somehow I didn’t have the heart to banish them. And then I visited a real world friend and found him merrily deleting anyone he hadn’t spoken to in six months.

This would be a relief, as I am tired of hearing about the activities of old flames.

Before the internet, bumping into an old love and finding they are married with kids would be a traumatic but mercifully rare occurrence.

With the advent of modern technology you can follow their updates from first date to the delivery room.

I have had to read endless posts like “Guess who just bought a big white dress?” Being an ex, I considered asking if she thought the colour appropriate, but I didn’t feel it would sit well with the messages of congratulations.

There was a “da dum der dum da da”. Sadly this turned out to be the wedding anthem, not a sign that her partner was about to be eaten by a shark.

The problem with deleting these girlies is that it seems rude and also implies you are still emotionally wounded.

However, I have decided to be brave.

If you are reading this on my profile you are obviously a much-loved friend, a valued acquaintance or someone I still see regularly enough to feel awkward about deleting you.

If you are reading this on the website, surprised it hasn’t popped up on Facebook this week – well, it’s been fun…