Last December, I started playing around with that Twitter thing.

It is the most irritating head wrecker I have come across yet, but it is strangely intriguing.  Like all good car crashes, I want to tear myself away, but I still want to find out what happens next.

To those of you who haven’t been sucked into it, it is a cross between instant messaging and mini-blogging.  The weirdest thing is that there is a limit of 140 characters.  So I couldn’t write what I’m writing now.

One of the things that annoys me most is that all the messages aren’t connected, so you need a good memory to remember what you said to whom.  And we all know that memory isn’t my strong point. 

Say for example, someone sends me an email –

Grandad – you’re a wanker.

That’s fine because I can reply to that –

Why?

> Grandad – you’re a wanker.

On the other hand, if they use Twitter they send

@headrambles You’re a wanker

I reply

@barackobama Why?

And they reply

@headrambles Why what?

because they have forgotten the original message.

You can see where the confusion arises?

Another concept that has me confused is the business of following people.  As of this moment I have 127 people following me around the place.  Yesterday I had 128, but I seem to have lost one.  It’s very easy to get lost in the mountains, and I’m certainly not going out to look for them in this weather.  Why are these people following me?  It’s worse that the damned CIA, and it took me long enough to get rid of them.

Then of course there is the language associated with it.  Twitter.  Tweeting.  Retweet. Twits.  For fuck’s sake!

Most of the time I just switch it off.  All those little messages informing me of new Tweets gets very irritating.  Then when I switch it on again, I haven’t a clue what’s going on.

So I do what I do best.

Spread confusion and mayhem.

Excuse me now. 

I have some Twittering to do.