Monday, June 18, 2012

Twitter Funk


I sometimes get into a Twitter funk.  I have nothing interesting to say (admittedly, this may happen more often than I think it does).  No one is saying anything worth retweeting.  There are no fascinating or funny or fascinating and funny stories to link to.  There’s just nothing.

Or it might be me.

Not that I’m clever and witty and insightful all the time.  But sometimes I feel like I can fake it.  Or the other people on Twitter help.  Someone might make a comment I respond to and it turns into a “conversation”.  Others join in.  It can really get fun, and sometimes silly.

My kids help.  They say and do funny—in my opinion—things that end up on twitter all the time.  I know I’m not the only one who’s heard someone in her house say something and then turn and tell you “do not tweet that, mom”.
 
The idiots driving in front of me, standing behind me in the grocery store line, or even the ones who work with me, also help. 

Can’t someone just do something stupid already so I can tweet it?

But I do not want to tweet just to tweet.  LOTS of people do this.  LOTS.  Random thoughts that have no context or meaning to me at all.  You know what I mean-- the “this is what I ate for lunch” tweets. 

A lot of my tweeting has to do with my writing life.  Okay, pretty much most of it.  I tweet about my writing and my books and I follow lots of writers and people who love and talk about books. All. The. Time.

Funny thing about that—sometimes I love it.  In my “real world” (whatever that means) there aren’t nearly enough people who read and talk books (not to mention read and talk about the books *I* read).  I love knowing I can get on twitter and instantly be surrounded by like-minded people.  I can catch up on industry news.  I can check out new releases.  I can read excerpts and drool over Pinterest pins.  I can see if my favorite authors are writing.  I can find out if any authors are behaving badly. 

But sometimes, not often, but sometimes, I get tired of all of that too. I get tired of the “read my book, read my book” stuff.  And I follow a lot of reviewers.  I don’t know why, but lately there are a lot of harsh reviews out there.  Sure, the books might deserve it, but I get tired of seeing people bashing books. 

So, thankfully, I follow some not-reading-community people too.  Stephen Colbert, Andy Borowitz, The Bloggess, just to name a few.  They make me laugh and get me out of the book-world for awhile.  Which is probably a good thing.
 
Now, don’t get me wrong—there are plenty of writing-community people who are funny.  And informative and entertaining and all of that.  But sometimes it’s good to get out of the bubble, just like it’s okay for me to once in a while reach for a caramel macchiato instead of my most-major-addiction-of-all: Starbuck’s coffee-flavored bottled frappucinos. 

It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen.

So, I want to know—who are the best non-reading-community people to follow?  Anyone that I’ve been missing all my life?

And how about the best reading-community people to follow? (and don’t say Smart Bitches or Dear Author.  Just don’t.)

Anyway... I do love Twitter most of the time.  I really do. 
So, Happy Tweeting To All!  May the Twitter-funk not hit you :)

Erin

6 comments:

  1. I've been in a big Twitter funk lately. My kids are grown so there's not much funny stuff there, though my puppy occasionally provides respites. I am still figuring out my writing process and so don't talk much about my writing. So yeah, I don't feel like I have much to add to the conversation. (Actually I feel that way a lot in real life too.)

    But even more, I've been getting bored on Twitter, bored by other people's constant promo, or even just regular yada yada yada posts that say nothing. Nothing I can relate to, nothing I can respond to. It's just seemed like such a huge timesuck lately. And this is from someone who has almost 35K tweets in the past three years...

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  2. Twitter Funk! Thank you for putting a name to it. Yeah...that's kind of what I have, I think. I love Twitter but sometimes I don't have anything interesting to say and neither does anyone else. Uh...present company always excepted, of course. lol!

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  3. Yeah, it's funny - sometimes Twitter is so much fun, and other times I find myself searching hard for something fun to respond to or start. Like the rest of you, I often feel I don't have much to say. I'm also losing patience with negativity, and I've unfollowed a few people lately because of that. I just don't need that in my life. I'm looking to Twitter to make friends and have some fun and maybe even let a few people know about my books, not to get all pissed off or righteously indignant.

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  4. I've pretty much given up on being clever. I just try to keep track of what day it is! Oh, and you wanted to know who's fun? The Tweet of God usually cracks me up--@TheTweetOfGod

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  5. I only follow a few people, and yes, I think about unfollowing a few. There is one who tweets everything they do. Really? How can everything you do have something funny? From breakfast to going to the store, there is always something funny? I seriously have no idea how this person gets anything done. There is another one who does nothing but put up picture after picture. Like ten in a row, with no description, just a picture. I worry that if I unfollow that I'll hurt their feelings, but I seriously doubt they would even notice.

    And Kelly said something about the negative thing...Well that's how I feel about Facebook. I am so tired of the political stuff from both my left and right friends that I am seriously thinking about blocking their feeds.

    But I follow the NNN because I love them and love what they post, even if I don't know what they are talking about. ;)

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  6. Going over to follow the Tweet of God! Love even the name :)

    And, Kim, don't feel bad... we don't know what we're talking about half the time either! lol

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