Twitter Addictions, Bambi and Dream On

Okay, Ill admit it:

I'm a Twitter addict.

I jumped on the wagon to see what the fuss is about and now I find myself learning the finer points of hashtags and retweets, sifting through the mindless drivel that most of the MLM guys post and wrestling with how to use this tool to my advantage. Will it help me sell a few more trade show exhibits? Perhaps. Will it keep me up to date and abreast on what absolute strangers are up to? Yes. But like Howard Stern's listeners, I want to know what's going to happen next.

You see, I am a no-nonsense type of guy. An intellectual figure who gets by on wits, my English degree, Rockstar Zero Carb, and my MacBook Pro. My office is my living room. Here's a shot of my view...everyday:

Let me tell you, this beats being in a cubicle. I have full access to my kitchen (right behind me), I have peace and quiet, and I don't have to deal with being pestered by corporate suck-ups who will do whatever it takes (including losing their identity and mores) to get ahead.

Ahhh the good life, right? Well, yes and no. I remember the steady paychecks and health insurance I used to get. They were great weren't they! I remember the smart people who saw the cracks in the system and tried to fix them with me. Yeah, I really miss corroborating with them. But I also saw the "lifers." Those folks who were complacent and just "happy to be employed." They reminded me of that old Monster.com commercial, where they had the little kids talking about how they wanted to "work their way up to middle management." That was true of my previous corporate employer. Imagine working in a place filled with people who were just happy to be there, satisfied with the banal, mediocre lives they were living. Day after day after day after day.

I digress.

So when Twitter hit the scene, I was really hesitant to join because a) I didn't know how this tool could be used -I was ignorant, like much of America probably still is about it- and b) it reminded me of someone who used to throw around a word that made my blood curdle.

Now we've probably all seen Bambi by now. If you are reading this post and you haven't been enlightened by one of Walt Disney's most controversial animated films, shame on your parents. How can they even look at themselves in the mirror? However, assuming that you have seen it, I'm going to press on like Lee's Nails.

I had this co-worker, one that I worked intimately with by no choice of my own, who really was a lifer. One day in a meeting, she used the word "twitterpated" and I about fell out of my seat. Ugggghhhh! That is such an ugly word. Why couldn't she have just said that so-and-so was "pissed off," or "flustered?" She had to go into the Bambi bag of vocab. She had to give me a reminder of her for the rest of my days.

I remember watching an episode of Dream On once, you remember, that old HBO series with Brian Benben as Martin Tupper. Well, he was trying to convince a black friend that he was hip to African-American culture by trying to use black slang, but he would overuse it and end up looking like a fool. The one incidence from that episode that has forever stuck in my mind was when he was eating some chips n' dip and he turns to his friend and says, "This dip is really....Def!" Now if you have ever seen the show, you'd know that the series is crammed full of hundreds of clips from all manner of old films, used as metaphors for Martin's reactions (hence the title). After he makes his remark about the dip, it cuts to a clip of an old film where a male actor says, "That's my word for the day." This is exactly what I thought of after hearing the word "twitterpated" come gurgling out of her lips.

However this wasn't her word of the day. No, this word became her word of the week, month, year, you name it! What was a boy to do, but carry around a pail to meetings so I could deposit my lunch into it. Ahhh, corporate America...why did I leave?

So you can imagine how difficult it is when I hear all these variations of Twitter apps and devices used for twittering (or is it tweeting?...who knows what the preferred nomenclature is). It brings back memories that need not be resurrected. I laid them to rest over a year ago, but like Lazarus, they find a way to live. The saddest part is that I am addicted to Twitter. So i have a feeling that these memories aren't going away anytime soon.

Does anyone out there know a good hypnotist?