I am not a great fan of social media.

I am all for keeping in touch with people and I wouldn't consider myself anti-social, but I just get really pissed off with this concept that I have to know absolutely everything about absolutely everyone. 

Twitter [God how I hate that name!] is OK in general and can be a bit of craic.  It does infuriate me though with the stream of messages telling me that someone "is so excited" to be doing something or "can't wait" to do something else.  I couldn't give a flying shite whether you are excited or impatient.  Why should I?  I tend to use Twitter as a news feed and a means to announce when I have posted something and prefer to keep my emotions where they belong – in my own head.

If people want to tweet about my tweets then that's fine by me, but I am still a tad unsure as to the etiquette involved.  If someone "likes" my tweet, am I supposed to thank them?  If I respond to someone's tweet twelve hours after they tweeted are they going to have a clue what I am on about?   Maybe there's a handbook on Twitter etiquette but I have never seen it.

Then there is Farcebook.  This is an area I tend to avoid because I find it annoying in the extreme.  The best policy I find is to ignore it altogether except when Herself wants to share something with me and I get a little email announcing the fact.  I find that a bit strange too, as she is usually in the same room as me at the time. 

Probably the worst aspect of Farcebook is the endless stream of "inspirational" quotes and messages [usually attributed to Einstein] which are trite and meaningless.  For all those who love them, I would suggest some light reading matter?

I don't mind those two too much but then we enter the area of all those other "social media" sites that for some unknown reason I joined in the past.  I joined hem [I think] to see what they were about as most of 'em don't give a hint until you have created an account.  But then they start bombarding me with emails from people wanting to "connect" with me for some unknown reason.  And I get emails suggesting what I might like.  For example, I just received a mail from Pinterest who are positive that I would be fascinated with "20 ways to lose 10 pounds in one week" or "25 uses for Epsom Salts"!  Fuck off!  That is yet another account I have deleted.

That is the problem with these sites – once you have joined, it is really fucking hard to un-join.  And once you have found that elusive tick-box they start whining – "are you sure you want to delete your account?"  Yes.  "Are you really sure?" YES!  "Are you really really really sure?"  Oh go fuck off!  And then they send me a mail telling me how terribly sorry they are to lose me and that I can rejoin any time I like.  I gave Linkedin the Big Fuckoff a while ago and I still get plaintive emails from people wanting to connect with me even though I don't exist any more which is a little worrying – does my spirit still linger on in the basement of Disqus, Linkedin and Pinterest?

I still have loads of accounts out there, but I haven't a clue what or where they are.  I only discover them when I get some kind of mail from them giving me their "latest exciting updates" or whatever, and then I have to waste an hour or two recovering my lost password and finding how to delete the fucking thing.

So if you find me on a social media site that isn't Twitter or Farcebook, it's probably just my ghost lingering on.

True immortality.