Tweet me up!

Some of you may not know that I actually post many times a day to one of my blogs. It's not this one, obviously, but rather my Twitter account. A while back I wrote here about Twitter when I first opened my account. After a period of ambivalence, I started to really embrace the service to the point that I now post around a half dozen times a day or so. I try to post each time something interesting happens, I have an interesting (to me) thought, or when I something new.

I have really enjoyed this because it allows me to maintain a public, short-attention-span diary of what I'm experiencing. Now, I'm not narcissistic enough to believe that anyone but me would even care about those sorts of minutia regarding my life. Rather, I just enjoy being able to document my life for my own purposes. Not that I go back and review it regularly, but it's interesting to write something (in 140-character chunks, no less) that I know may be around indefinitely.

What makes twitter really cool, however, is that it has such a simple API that many other applications, websites, and services can easily integrate Twitter into what they can offer. For instance, when I post a public video to Viddler, Viddler automatically posts a link to the video on my Twitter account. The same is true when I post a mobile photo to Flickr through the use of TwitterGram. One of the cooler integrations, however, is that I can set Facebook to use my latest Twitter post (or tweets, as they're known) as my current Facebook status. And because I can tweet from the web, numerous desktop clients, IM, and SMS, I can post anything from almost anywhere. There are also reply, direct message, and privacy functions, which theoretically could be used to expand the possibilities much further, but I haven't had a chance to fully explore these. One notable example, however, is one programmer's use of a private twitter account (and some fancy-schmancy curl scripts) to create an iPhone lo-jack system for finding a lost iPhone.

My purposes, however, are much simpler: I just want to keep track of what I'm doing! So along those lines, I thought I might start posting a Twitter Digest on this blog periodically. It's just a summary of all of my tweets during the previous 24-hour period. So here's the digest for yesterday, June 5, 2008. (BTW, if anyone out there reading this already has a twitter account, let me know and I'll follow you.)

Twitter Digest for June 5, 2008:

• Making the most of another no-show by Installing OpenPandora. Good use of my time, right?
• The lengths that people go to avoid talking about the problem amazes me, especially when they COME to therapy to talk about their problems.
• Came home for lunch today for no reason and feeling guilty for wasting the gas needed for the 7 minute drive.
• @cdevroe Here you go. http://is.gd/rCl
• Already had too many cancellations this week. The summer client dropoff has officially begun!
• @ecc1977 Absolutely! A Facebook app for GFF would be a great idea. I'd use it.
• Looking for a good twitter client for Windows to use at work. Methinks I'll give Twhirl a whirl.
• I am really up too late. I need to go to bed. **anticipating my own worthlessness tomorrow**
• After the LAST t-ball practice of the season, trying to pretend we can have a clean house with 2 small children.

Twitter

Okay, so I guess it's pretty obvious that I only write on my blog when I have nothing better to do. Well, I guess that might start to happen more often now. I have recently started working the night shift on weekends at a local hotel. It's mainly just for some extra money, and since I usually work the overnight shift, it's easy, and I'm still around to see my family.

So that is where I am now. I would usually have a book or something to pass the time on nights like this (virtually all of the regular work is done, and almost all of the guests are checked in), but I decided not to bring the book tonight. So here I am, posting on the blog that surely gets lonely in between visits and posts, but that's surely to change now.

Anyway, for a while now, I've been meaning to blog about twitter.com. For those who don't know, twitter is kind of like a blog with ADHD. It's just short snippets of information about what the blogger is currently up to or thinking about. It's very easy to follow the posts of others via SMS, IM, or RSS. The best part is that there are numerous methods that you can update it, like through the web, widgets, IM, or SMS. I also like the fact that there's no need to go into great detail; just type the brief thought and move on. If you want to check out my twitter, go to twitter.com/jasonact.

Also, I've begun tracking my music listening habits on Last.fm. The best thing about that site is that it requires no effort on my part. It automatically updates as I listen to music either through iTunes or with my iPod. You can check out my last.fm page here.

That sneaky little viddler

I recently found this website that is essentially a blog engine designed exclusively for videos. It makes it very easy to record, upload, and even leave timed comments and tags. There's also a social networking aspect to the videos because they are so easy to interact with. Actually, that's one aspect that I didn't think I would care for, but I find that I really like it. It really can build community in a virtual world, only this seems a bit more real because there is actual video to respond to, and not just text.

Well, it's much too late, and I should have been asleep an hour ago. Tomorrow is going to be rough. I hope to post more often in the next few weeks. Here's an embed of my latest Viddler entry:

Word toss

Sometimes when I step back to think about the way that we use words in our lives, I notice how cavalier we can be about the use of some words. Perhaps in this "age of affirmation and hyperbole", we often try to use words that highlight how intense we feel or how much we believe in whatever we are stating. We use words like "hate", "love", "hideous", and "beautiful" to describe things as mundane as a turkey sandwich (okay, maybe not a sandwich, but you get my point), not to mention the persistent misuse of "always" and "never". I most definitely include myself in this. In my normal histrionics, I have been known to throw out the occasional hyperbole, but how helpful is that really? Does it really help me convey my meaning any better? Probably not. In my opinion, it really only serves to water-down language by making emphatic words less emphatic.

A related problem is the misuse of words that don't really fit the context. Two of the more misused words, I think, are arrogance and bravery. Arrogance is often used to describe someone who is confident or proud of themselves. While some such people may be arrogant, I don't think all of them are because arrogance carries with it the assumption of a value judgement. Arrogance implies that the confidence and pride is reason for believing that the self is better than others. In other words, if a person is confident in their own abilities and proud of their prior accomplishments, but does not see that as reason to place him/herself in higher standing or deserving of special privileges, are they really arrogant? I don't think so. Confidence is a good thing, and we should encourage it, but we shouldn't confuse confidence with arrogance. With bravery, we often throw that word around when fear is not an issue. I don't think someone can be brave if they aren't afraid. Otherwise, they are simply being. Fear is a necessary part of bravery. A person cannot be brave if they do not fear.

Anyway, those are only two examples. I'm sure there are many others. Like I said, I'm at least as bad about this as anyone else. I try to moderate it at times, but like I said, my histrionic tendencies sometimes come out despite my best efforts. I've just been thinking a lot lately about how we can't take language for granted. Communication is essential to relationships and growth, and we sometimes do a poor job of communicating when we don't use language appropriately.