Bookmarks: Follow Me

One of my "commute" shots, at Cahuenga Blvd. and Melrose Ave. in Los Angeles

When I started using Twitter, I immediately followed writers because writers are known to be witty and entertaining. Thus my Twitter stream would be a cocktail party of constant twit-wit. But at least half the writers I've followed tweet nothing but advertisements for their books. My stream becomes more difficult to read (not to mention more dull) with each new link-laden pitch.

Will #Harry meet #Sally? find out at www.afghk;l
My friends love #an'orhw39i3 !
Nominated for two #SelfNom awards!...? http://nr[0hW
Click here! www. 1t09483t7
#FFpqt49ei Buy www.apgohw4g http://=50 this!

I unfollow these people. I'm sure they unfollow me, too, because they're on Twitter to collect followers, not to make contacts. They might think they're on Twitter to make sales, though I doubt that's going to happen. It's like they're hitting people over the head repeatedly with bus stop benches.

I'm on Twitter mostly so people can find me if that's where they happen to look. Do you use Twitter? What do you use it for? What does it take for you to buy a product from someone you meet on Twitter? I would imagine you would at least have to like them first, but I'm guessing.

I like Twitter, or at least my Utopian idea of it, but I rarely think of anything witty to say in 140 characters. (Ha! And I expected other writers to be witty.)

It's okay to advertise, just not every minute of every day. By the way, Camelot & Vine is nominated for five SelfNom awards! Wish me luck.

Pic of a Twit

When I was a kid, my nickname was Tweeter.

Please don't laugh, but yesterday I finally figured out how to upload a photo to Twitter using Twitpic. The first time I looked at Twitpic I must have been distracted or upside-down or sleep-walking, because it's about as easy as an application can be. Yesterday I cleared my desk and sat down with a cup of coffee, determined to figure it out, and it was like figuring out how to open an envelope.

This is the photo I posted. I hope you don't mind me posting it again here. I don't know if most of you follow me on Twitter. (There's a little birdie button over there on the upper left if you should choose to do so.) Even if you follow me, the chances that you were on at the moment I posted the picture are so slim that I don't mind posting it again.

I took the shot from my antique iPhone. My thought when I saw this was, I hope I never have to choose between natural light and bookshelves.

You know, when I was a kid, besides the fact that we
had no windows
or bookshelves,
walked to school ten miles in the snow,
made our own toys,
slaughtered our own chickens,
churned our own butter
and
made our own clothes out of burlap bags,
"twit" was something you called someone you thought very little of.

But I was Tweeter which, as I remember it, was quite another thing.

Window Tweetment

I have Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and a blog and it's already enough/plenty/on the verge of too much. Some people digg and delicious and Classmates and Flickr and Friendster and the list goes on and on. (I tried Library Thing briefly but that was too obsessive even for me.)

Do you tweet? "Tweeter" was my nickname when I was a kid, but as an adult I'm having a hard time coming up with things to tweet about. Location tweets are out--too dangerous. An occasional retweet is okay, but too many of those and you start looking lazy. And I don't want to be boring: I swear, some people will tweet about whether to have the chocolate muffin or the peach tart with their coffee. Do you care whether I'm cleaning the bathtub or stuck on a sentence? You do not.

I could surf the web for interesting websites or newsy bits to tweet about, but I'm not desperate to tweet. I understand the importance of platform, but mainly what I'm doing over here is trying to write.

Part of my problem is I have two Twitter accounts, one for PasadenaDP and one for me. I must shut one down. I think I'd rather be me.

What do you tweet about?