5 Reasons Twitter is like that shitty show Passions

Do you remember Passions? It was on Australian TV in the late 90s and the first half of the naughties when I was in late high school. I know, I didn't realize it had run for that long either.

With people having Princess Diana as a guardian angel, a bizarre never-fucking-ending love triangle, amnesia, witches, a weird doll that came alive, the live-in nurse that was an orangutan (WTF?! BamBam, who played 'Precious' was even nominated for an Emmy), some rich folk who meddled in other people's lives and numerous doubtful paternaties. And sometimes all of that in just one episode.

I watched about a dozen episodes. At one point in school it became cool to watch it just so you could take the piss out of it the next day. It was verging on being so bad it was good but didn't quite make it, landing squarely in the poke-eyes-out-rather-that-watch-this-shit basket. 

In my current I-don't-like-Twitter-anymore phase (which sure as shit will be over the next time I'm on a train and need rescuing from my boredom and hate for being alone), I've decided that Twitter and Passions have a bit in common:

5 Reasons Twitter is like Passions

1. You can go away for a month, come back and still see the same arguments being rehashed. FFS! How many times does that whiney little bitch have to go on about the boy not liking her, even after she is the one who cheated on him... right now I could be talking about EITHER. Substitute the topic for monetization or ethics in blogging (or being tired of Twitter) and lather, rinse, repeat.

2. There are lots of fucking weirdos. Twitter is full of them, hence why I am there. Harmony, the thankfully fictional town in Passions was also full of them. Don't just go straight to Tabitha the witch, the whole fucking town was loopy, there are too many to even mention. 

3. There are heaps of whiney bitches. That chick Theresa? OMG I wanted to slap her upside the head every time she spoke or did that lip quivery thing. Same goes with people who continuously whinge on Twitter like me. No, it's true, one of the things I hate most about Twitter is my own tweets - shut up already, woman!

4. There are a couple of hot and awesome people who don't know you even exist. Like that one hot awesome guy who never got cast again because OMG YOU'RE THE GUY FROM PASSIONS. I don't know what his name was, but his career has not gone from strength to strength. Twitter is the same - a few hot people that are getting their 15 minutes of fame who don't even know you exist. It's fucking depressing, why am I even there?

5. It sucks you in, even when it's shit. Like that one week I watched Passions to find out if Whiney McWhinerson would marry the hot brooding guy. It was a train wreck, I couldn't look away. A whole week I watched only to find out that a viewing week was a Passions minute and shit just draaaaags. That's a week I'll never get back. Twitter drags you in too - especially the shit fights and hilarious hashtags. One minutes it's all "I'll just have a quick look" and the next it's "I forgot to feed the dog and it's 1am".

For a serious "ummm WTF?" moment, check out this clip. Now I'm all for not being politically correct all the time but everyone in a psychiatric hospital playing with dolls? Yeah, nice.



Do you have a love/hate relationship with Twitter? Did you watch Passions?

Yellow Pages Capture The Cover Competition

This is a compensated post* 

I have all the apps ever created for taking photos, editing them, organizing them and sharing them. ALL of them. Sadly, the number of apps I have has absolutely no correlation to the level of talent I possess for photography. As a result, you lot are subjected to my "chuck a filter on it and it'll be fine" approach. Hey, it's working for me so far. The only problem is that when people meet for the first time they wonder why I don't have flawless skin and a permanent duck face expression.

But some of you lot are fantastic whether it's with your phones, a point and shoot, or with a fancy pants DSLRs. I don't even know what DSLR means, but I'm just going to assume it stands for Did Someone Let Rip? Amiright?

This year the Yellow Pages is running a Capture the Cover competition (say that three times fast) where you are invited to, well, capture the cover.

The covers of local issues will feature local images taken by local people. Local, local, local. If your picture ends up on the cover not only will your image be on the phone tables of thousands of households (or holding up computer monitors and acting as bookshelves in student accommodation) but you can win fabulous prizes including fancy pants cameras, iPads and cold hard cash. Ca-ching!

Tricky tried to get in on the action but had a little trouble... it seems when given a spunky blue toddler proof camera, he only takes photos of himself. He was all "What? My face is in my local area! Be more specific with your instructions, woman!" When I said it just wasn't gonna cut it, that he wasn't meant to show faces in his pics, he attempted to eat the camera in defiance.

I wonder where he gets that from?

First cab off the rank is Perth! Yay! So get snapping your local area now. Other cities are going to follow soon so you East Coasters can start prepping. 

To enter your pics and learn the Ts and Cs, head to the official website at CaptureTheCover.com. If you're a Twitter junkie, follow @YellowPages_au and keep an eye on the official hashtag #capturethecover and see how many places you can recognize. Alternatively, check out the Yellow Pages facebook page for more info. I'll be joining in on the fun but sadly, I dont' qualify for any of the prizes and with his stellar photography of his own face, neither does Tricky.

*I was not paid for this post. I received a toddler-proof camera from the Yellow Pages to help Capture The Cover

This one time, I went to Sydney just to go to a party

It would appear that I'm making a little habit of whirlwind trips to other states. This weekend I threw off the confines of the SAHM title and partied like it was 1999. Well, actually, more like it was 2000 because I was 17 for all but two weeks of 1999 and sure as shit someone will send me an email saying I'm a terrible role model encouraging underage drinking if I don't spell out exactly what I mean.

My partner in crime (which is JUST A SAYING) was the inimitable Real Jive Turkey. The Jive and I had never traveled together before and I wasn't sure what to expect. It was suggested I vajazzle my vajayjay as one must be prepared for everything, including body cavity searches by airport officials, but I stopped short and just threw a handful of glitter at my crotch instead.

The red-eye flight over was uneventful, that is unless, of course, you consider inhaling other people's farts, singing along to our respective iPods and a dismal attempt to vlog at 35,000 feet to be a highlight.

We touched down in Sydney at 6am, having not slept, and decided, since we couldn't check in yet, to hit the ground running and do all the standard cliche touristy things like eat McDonalds for breakfast, take photos of a bridge and a building we'd both seen many times before and sit in Starbucks charging our phones like wankers.

Starbucks, nuts (!!!) and ironing RJT's shirt using a GHD - highlights in anyone's book

The delightful Mrs Woog offered to leave a key out at her house for us to go and crash but I became so overwhelmed with which room I would snoop through first I felt strange to visit someone's house for the first time when they weren't even home, so we declined. This was a huge mistake and the dark rings under my eyes grew two shades darker in protest. Though apparently if I say they grew fifty shades of grey darker all the mums reading this will spontaneously orgasm.

I hit the wall at about 11am, having been awake for 27 hours, and decided that a giant can of carbonated caffeine and paying someone to rub my body would be the only way forward. I sat in the massage chair at a place called Unwind in Erskine Street and had THE BEST massage of my life. I had to restrain myself from groaning in pleasure as she pummeled my muscles in to submission and when she was finished I felt like I should kneel down and worship her. I didn't because it would mean getting down and getting back up again and, really, who has time for that when free drinks are waiting for you?

We pressed on to Bungalow 8 for a fab, slightly liquid lunch with some Bloggy friends. The Jive's list of female blogger friends has just increased ten fold because despite the fact that the conversation veered towards vaginas for a while, he appreciates how dedicated we are at pretending we don't have kids and getting drunk partying.

Liz, Zoey, Kristie, Rah, Me, JJ, Fi, Salz, Alyce, Nicole, Denyse, The Jive, Lily & Cassie

We couldn't keep our eyes open any longer we headed to our "hotel" at the official check in time. I was in charge of booking the hotel and it's safe to say that that responsibility will never land in my lap again as it became glaringly obvious I had booked us in to a dingy backpackers with convent-like rooms. The shower screen was broken, the shower head was broken, the windows didn't close (and it was FREEZING) and the beds were actually lumps of concrete covered in a blanket so thin I've seen layers of dust that have been thicker. But it was clean, it was cheap and it was central.

I closed my eyes and laid there, in the cold, trying to will myself to sleep for two hours before I decided it was pointless and that Twitter would be much more interesting than the insides of my own eyelids. I was right. Y'all are very entertaining.

Fast forward through what seemed like hours of serious hair styling from The Jive and we rocked up at the party that we were in town for. StMurphy's 40th. The atmosphere was electric and it was so exciting to meet people I'd been chatting to on Twitter for ages (like McDimples!), a whole bunch of new people that I'm now actively stalking, catch up with my faves Mrs Woog and SawHole, and, of course, give the birthday boy a hug and an awesome (if I do say so myself) card.

Card created using MoonPig.com.au

Mrs Woog started introducing me as one of Australia's best mummy bloggers to all her celeb friends who were there and despite me telling her she was full of shit, she continued. So I did what any self respecting new media junkie would do and let her carry on safe in the knowledge that the darkened room would be enough to camouflage my flushed cheeks and the massive headswell that was occuring.

Celebrity whoring it up (with a super bright nose removing iPhone flash) with StMurphy, Julie Goodwin,
Mrs Woog, Saw Hole, McDimples, Charlotte Dawson, The Jive, Natarsha Belling and Jo Thornley

I managed to embarrass myself by discussing the pros and cons of female urinals with Jo Thornley, complete with actions, and reverted to very similar miming tactics when my voice, which had been failing all day, completely gave up around 1:00am (after over 40 hours awake). A development that left me with the rather unenviable moniker of *ahem* "cock throat" for the rest of the weekend shenanigans.

A sleep in a concrete bed, a walk around The Rocks and a meet up at the pub with some new friends topped off an amazing weekend in Sydney and I was home by 11:00pm on Sunday night. And much like The Jive's luggage, my voice still hasn't returned. But it was so worth it.

10 Things to do during a blackout... when all your friends live inside your computer

The power went out for 19 hours the other day. For someone who spends so much time sitting at my laptop, it was crippling. I have spent longer periods of time offline, but I'd had a chance to prepare for those - empty the inbox, stalk some people on Facebook and charge my phone; all the important things. But this time? Well, this was thrust upon me unknowingly.

Friends were worried about how I'd cope - would I experience withdrawals? Would I have a break down? And, most importantly, how on earth would I keep my lap warm without my precious, albeit almost dead, laptop?

Here are the top ten things to do during a blackout, that *ahem* may or may not be exactly what I did during the #PerthBlackout. 

1. Play find the coffee table with your foot while hunting for candles. Extra points if you find it with your pinkie toe and bend it back far enough that you wonder if it requires medical attention

Jumping up and down in agony after stubbing my toe

2. Use your smart phone to try and find out when the power will come back on. Realize that the entire state is trying to find out at the same time and the site has crashed. Tweet about it, but don't reply to anyone because you're saving your battery.

3. Use the light on your phone to find your proper torch. Curse the day you let your child use said torch as a toy because the batteries are now flat. Hunt around the house for others; check that basket of junk in your laundry, stereos, portable speakers and *ahem* the "special mummy daddy draw".

4. Cook dinner by the light of the gas flame and a couple of candles. Because the rangehood won't work and it's too bloody cold to open any doors, it's likely you'll set the smoke alarm off. Because the house is so eerily silent, the alarm will sound at least 7000 times louder than usual. Tweet a picture.

Candle light dinner prep

5. Turn the light switch on every time you enter a room and feel like a tool. In an effort to cover your stupidity, shout out "I was just testing". Realize that nothing can ever, ever, ever cover how much of an idiot you are.

6. Turn your smart phone in to a wifi hotspot so your partner can check his email and Twitter. Watch your battery life drain before your eyes and shut it down, panicking that you now only have 10% left and no idea of when the power will be back.

7. Play with glow sticks. If you're a male, shove a glow stick bracelet around your tackle and sing "If ya like it then you shoulda put a cock ring on it". Threaten to Tweet a picture and watch him run away, screaming like a girl.

Not sure that's very hygienic

8. Drive a suburb over to an almost equally Twitter-dependent  friend's house so that you can both use your car charger. Cruise the streets checking out the fallen down trees and having a bit of a gossip while the phones charge. Stop to get chips to keep your energy levels up.

9. Go to your neighbour's house and ask if they want to play murder in the dark. Hear them scream and run away to call the police because you didn't introduce yourself first. Make a hasty retreat and be thankful that it was so dark they couldn't possibly give an accurate description.

10. Have a freezing cold shower then jump in to bed and warm your icy feet up on your husband's back while simultaneously warming your hands on his front. Hang on tight, he's likely to buck.

What do you do during a blackout? Does it involve inappropriate use of glow sticks?

A week in tweets

The fabulous Emma from Mommy Has A Headache (and one half of Cocktails at Naptime) demanded I take part in let me know about the awesome meme created by Jo of Slummy Single Mummy - a week in tweets - complete with funky badge. I don't do anything these days unless I get a badge... I'm like a misguided Girl Scout or something.


Without further ado, this is what the last seven days would look like if I was restricted to one tweet a day. Can you imagine me only tweeting once a day? Yeah, me neither.
Tuesday:
In Sydney today for the #NortonOne shindig at Café Sydney. This blogging thing rocks my socks… in this case, anti DVT flight socks.

Wednesday:
Bought some Max Brenner pecans to take home for Map Guy… they didn’t make it. What can I say? The bald man has great nuts #DontTellMapGuy

Thursday:
Tricky is unwell and appears to be afraid of snot -cries whenever he wipes his nose. Is this what is meant by the boogie monster? #KillMeNow

Friday:
Sitting at home with wine, cheese, olives and a looming deadline. Boy do I know how to party! #AllWorkAndNoPlayMakesGlowUseLongHashtags

Saturday:
Just been to the BEST vintage/retro/rockabilly inspired wedding! Congratulations @WondersOfAllis! You looked divine #WonderWedding (yes, I gave my friends a wedding hashtag)

Sunday:
This getting up at the crack of dawn on a Sunday can go bite me. Meanwhile I will go bite the buttermilk pancakes, bacon and maple syrup I just made #NOMS

Monday:
Kinda chuffed with my first ever attempt at cake decorating #frangipanis #GlowMakesCakes #FondantOverload 
 

I could put a call to action question here about your week, but really, all I want to know is that you think my cake looks amazeballs

Of Twitter Haters and PR Fails

This post was going to be a standard Mummy Blogger post about how I got up at 5:30am the other day (alternatively known as the ass crack of the day, a time when no human should be awake) so Tricky could see the bus that Map Guy had hired for a bucks party. It was going to be warm and fuzzy and leave the females in the audience with aching ovaries at all the cuteness of an excited toddler's dreams coming true as a bus pulled in to our driveway and took him for a ride up and down the street.

But all that went flying out the window when I checked Twitter at our post-awesome-bus-trip breakfast on the edge of the Swan River and saw this:

Gee, tell me how you really feel.

So I had a look at Biker Vet's account, found out he followed fourteen people, had nine followers and tweeted mainly about bikes, the defense forces and bad PR. No other tweets anything like the one directed at me, so it obviously wasn't just a random hate account. Someone I know? An ex? A friend of a friend of a non-friend who's decided to be a super mature keyboard warrior, hiding behind a pseudonym?

I of course decided to take the moral high ground and not be caught up in it. Well, I would have, but it was much more fun to do this:

Which I think sorta upset him. Or perhaps it was the half dozen retweets of it? Or the tweets of others, like Super Daddy saying not only did he give a flying fuck but a rat's arse too. Love my tweeps!

He countered:

Riiight. So I'm a clueless, vacuous bimbo who needs to get a life, yet HE'S the one spending time sending hate tweets? The irony bubbled up around me and I went for a swim in it! Irony spa FTW!

But I'm thrilled to find out I apparently work in PR. Sending a few muesli bars and calling people Dear Blogger? I could totally do that, thanks Biker Vet for your encouragement to change careers!

By this stage a few people had noticed and were asking what I'd done to make this guy so cranky at me. I told them I had no idea and he was obviously watching my tweets because he replied:

And attached this photo with one name blocked out:

Yes, that's right. I did a reply all to @claytonwfu5y who had spammed us all (that account is now suspended because I always block and report spam) and for that, I am being called horrid names as if we're in a playground. And for the record, one of the others in the group, who understands what a reply all is, retweeted it.

Interestingly on Biker Vet's timeline he complains about clicking on a link that has now infected his email account... there is NO LINK in my tweet, I'm complaining about said link in my tweet, yet I'm the spammer?  Sheesh!

Just after that tweet I get an email from a newly created Biker Vet gmail account (a warning popped up that it was a new linked account) saying "This was posted to my business twitter account. It may not have come from you. Please confirm." with a copy of the same image with the name blocked out.

Ohhhh right, so he checked it was from me after calling me a clueless, vacuous bimbo? Way to jump the gun, Biker Vet.

So I assume (possibly making an "ass out of u and me", but hey, I'm gonna go with it) that the name blocked out is Biker Vet's business account that he mentions. I also assume that Biker Vet has no idea that I can find this out by a two second search of my own timeline. And voila, we have our answer.

Mr Biker Vet, you are unmasked... and I could spill the beans and tell the world (well a few thousand readers) who it was that was posting such crude comments about me, but I'm going to restrain myself for a few reasons, number one, because I don't want a barrage of readers to go to your website and give you traffic and number two, I won't be pulled in to a defamation lawsuit.

But I know who you are. So how about I click on over to your page and see what you do, shall we? Oh, look at that, you do personal training and... wait for it... PR! Can you say PR Fail?

I have replied to both tweet and email (cc-ing in his real email address that took a whole five seconds to find on his website), stating that it was a reply all to a spammer... and he's refusing to reply to me. Radio silence. Crickets chirping and tumbleweeds. Me thinks he's not so tough now that I know his real name?

So kudos, Biker Vet, for a massive PR Fail before your PR company is even off the ground.

What have we learned from this adventure? The internet is forever, everything is traceable, I'm now classed as Twitter Royalty for having a hater and my tweeps are awesome. The end.

I'm putting this to bed now. No Twitter flame wars on my behalf, thanks.

10 Reasons Why I Don't Follow You On Twitter

So this is the third installment of 'Why I Don't' posts, hot on the heels of Why I Don't Read Your Blog and Why I Don't Comment On Your Blog. In short, it's a thinly veiled bitch session.

Twitter is my favourite thing in the world (@glowless in case you were wondering). Awake at midnight? Go talk to someone! Something important happens in the world? Find out within mere minutes - most of the time from eye witnesses (and RTs) more than half an hour before it gets on even the top news sites. But mostly it is where I go for shits and giggles with my buddies from all around the world... and to avoid housework, obviously.

10 Reasons Why I Don't Follow You On Twitter

1. You're a company and the only thing you tweet is your latest deal over and over again. If I wanted to see so many damn ads I'd watch commercial television. Twitter is an amazing marketing tool but you have to engage with me. This also counts if you use your business account to just retweet your own blog account. If there is no point of difference between the two, one has to go.

2. You only retweet others. If I want to know what they're saying, I'll follow them thankyouverymuch. Say something original but preferably not just a blow by blow account of what you're doing unless you happen to be "doing" a celebrity.

3. You have no bio. I know, I know, they can be a bitch to write but it is the biggest make or break for me. I need to immediately know if you're a person or a company, if we have anything in common and if you're going to give me some level of entertainment. And further to this please list your location to the nearest city... if you put your location as "Earth" I'll just think you're a dickhead or an alien. Same goes if your avi is that stupid bloody egg.

4. Your name, Twitter handle and blog name are so different to each other that I have no idea who the hell you are. Here's a hint, if they're really different put the information in your bio, there's even a special spot for a link so USE IT! Make it easy for me, people!

5. You tweet quotes and pretend they're your own. Just like the other eleventy hundred bajillion people on the interwebz, I got that viral email in 2003 too, so I've heard the joke before. You're not fooling anyone, mister!

6. You follow and unfollow me to get my attention. Now this can be used as a way of covertly gauging if someone has intentionally unfollowed you or if the phantoms of the Twittersphere have worked their evil magic again and just kicked you off a list. But once you've done it once and I don't follow back, perhaps it's a useful clue. It smacks of desperation when you do it weekly, so don't. This is even worse if you're a business - yes, I'm looking at YOU Perth video making company that shall remain nameless.

7. You use too many hashtags. Do #you #really #need #every #single #word to be one? This is of course null and void if your hashtags are hilarious and involve mention of nipples, wine and/or Glow Jobs.

8. Your tweets are set to private. WHY?!?!?! Twitter is about being in a global conversation, don't cut yourself out of it! It doesn't make sense so I automatically think you're a douche and won't follow you. If for some incredible reason I do send a follow request, whenever I go to RT you I get a little warning from Twitter telling me I'm RTing protected content... it's annoying in a first world problem kinda way.

9. All your tweets are about your damn cat and your lonely single life. Unless you're Bridget Jones and can tell me some saucy stories about getting it on with Daniel Cleaver, whining all the freaking time about your non existent social life is just infuriating. Join an online dating site or, I dunno, put down Mr Snuggles for a goddamn minute and go out in to the real world for once.

10. You tweet racist, homophobic, xenophobic, sexist crap under the thin veneer of humour and the protection afforded you for being considered a celebrity social commentator. There is no excuse for being a bigoted twat, grow up.

Why don't you follow someone on Twitter? I'm expecting the new little bird on the scene might get a mention here.

The Dreaded Unfollow

There's some rather childish stuff going on in the world of Facebook at the moment. Shock, horror! Facebookians being childish?! Well I never.

As a result I don't really go on my private account very much and have limited what most people can see. And yes, I'm aware of just how counter productive that sounds considering I put my whole life on a blog. But I reserve the right to be contradictory mmkay?

Instead I spend all my time on Twitter. It's way better. Don't ask me about Google+ just yet, I've only been on there twice.

Ding ding!

Yes it's confusing when you start, but right when you get over the whole "I'm talking to myself" thing is when someone will actually start talking back and, hey presto, you've got some new mates.

The difference between the two, for me, is that it all comes down to The Dreaded Unfollow! You Facebookians would know it as The Dreaded De-Friend! Dun dun duuuuuun.

You see, when you're on Facebook you go about your merry way and your friends list stays the same unless you go in and manually remove someone (or they remove you...). With Twitter though, there is random unfollows.

It's like Twitter goes premenstrual and just ditches some of your best mates without asking you and then demands a kilo block of chocolate and a Drew Barrymore flick.

Now even though everyone knows this happens, I still get that sinking feeling every time it's brought to my attention with a "I tried to DM you but you're not following me..." Always with the ellipses, like it's just hanging there waiting for the YOU BITCH I'M NEVER TALKING TO YOU AGAIN to be tacked on the end.

My head starts to spin: They'll think I don't like them! Will they now unfollow me now? Have I offended them? OMG they're gonna think I'm a snobby cow! Noooo!

Oh the shame! What happens next is a quick dance of re-following, public damning of twitter and assuring said person that it was definitely just a glitch in the matrix system.

All the time knowing that when it happens the other way around, yes I do wonder what happened, then shrug my shoulders and think mah, it's the internet, real life is what matters.

Do you panic when you've found yourself victim of The Dreaded Unfollow/De-Friend?