On the one hand, you complain that "my friends' list on LJ takes me off the main page to read the whole post." I don't understand that; unless the post is behind a cut, mine don't. But on the other, on FB you have to click on a Note in order to read it, do you not? Whether it's a separate web page or an expansion makes no difference that I can see.

I don't get any advertisements on LJ, and no, I don't have a paid account. I use Adblock Plus on my Firefox. Works like a charm, and wipes out all those annoying moving graphical doodads on commercial sites too.