Friday 30 January 2009

I feel a real twit

I'm in a quandary


Many moons ago I signed up to Friends Reunite. What fun I thought, you can look up your old school friends and see what they have been up to over the years. Then dear FR started charging for emails and frankly I was miffed - this wasn't what I signed up for but reluctantly I paid my £7 (?) and mailed a few old school mates. Now of course the service is free and you can mail away to your heart's content and believe me some people are doing just that.

This week I had a message from somebody I don't know, never heard of them, can't remember them for toffee and I don't know what to do about it- should I mail this woman back and explain that the ravages of time and a misspent youth have addled my brain and I can't remember going to school with her? or should I just ignore her message and leave it sitting in my inbox as a permanent reminder that I am a bad person who doesn't deserve friends? I did ask an old friend who has a wonderful memory for all things scholastic (I can't even remember the name of my favourite teacher - how bad is that!) but even she didn't know the name. I feel so guilty, this woman obviously knew me and even mentioned that I used to have long red hair - shit, what ever I do will feel wrong. I don't want to upset her by telling her that she is truly unmemorable but on the hand it seems rude not to reply, but on the third hand I tried searching for her in my old schools and couldn't find her, so maybe she isn't who she says she is - maybe she is a stalker - maybe she isn't a she at all - maybe I'm being groomed!! But probably I'm just being neurotic and should get on with some work.

While I'm rabbiting about this social networking stuff I have a confession to make - I have joined Twitter - and what a strange phenomenon that is. If I'm honest I only signed up because of an interview I saw/heard with Steven Fry who was raving about it, shallow I know but at least I'm honest.

The trouble is I don't know what to do on there. I am 'following' mainly news based and current affairs type stuff ( as well of course as Steven Fry) and it was very strange that half an hour after I started 'following' Barrack Obama (how cool is that) I had message to say that he was following me.....Do you think that means that some poor sod in the Pentagon or the White House is logging onto to Twitter each day to see what Barry's 'followers' are twittering about? I wonder how much they get paid? I wonder if they have ever considered employing a remote worker for the job? Just think they could be paying me for doing something that is a bigger waste of time than being a mystery shopper (don't ever believe that customer service is important in this country - that way lies madness!) after all what do they expect Barry's followers to be twittering about? world domination and the collapse of capitalism?? As far as I can see the only things being talked about are either breaking news from Channel 4 or random twitters telling you what they had for breakfast - as I've said many times before the web is a very strange place!

2 comments:

Barry said...

I have to confess I don't "get" twitter. I've visited a few times and I've had friends rave about it; but I just don't see the attraction.

It must be me.

Joyce said...

No Barry It's me as well!