My A to Z of Facebook - Part One

This Blog has been a long time coming and recent changes to Facebook mean that I have to get it out of my system so here goes.... WARNING! Some of this is funny but some of it may make you squirm!

A is for Affairs of The Heart and all the angst and fall out they cause. There is actually a website called Facebook Cheating.com . According to The Telegraph, 1 in 5 affairs are conducted through Facebook. Now, I'm not going to preach to you because I was one of those statistics. I am single and he was very married. An old school friend, yeah, I know, but this was a few years back. I really thought he was a decent person. But Keith (and you are very lucky I don't mention your full name on here) was a pathological liar, shoplifter and collector of sexual diseases. He was sleeping with several women and was obviously too stupid to understand the term 'safe sex' because he managed to give his long suffering wife genital warts. Luckily I managed to extricate myself from the situation before I was exposed to any nasties. His wife likes to comment on my Blog from time to time, putting the blame firmly at my door. Blame? and you still want him love? My only regret is losing a lovely girlfriend because of his lies. If you're going to do it, then don't! It really isn't worth the fall out.

B is for Bejewelled Blitz .This is one of the most addictive games known to man and has ruined my life, it is more addictive than crack. I can give it up (she says sniffing into her sleeve), I can beat it and I CAN remain top of the leaderboard no matter what it takes! Bejewelled is something you play with your friends. In fact, I am so friendly on it that I never share points and tie my son to the bed until he gives in and sends me at least 10 lots of points via his FB account. I have also been known to withold food until he agrees!

C is for CIA or Intelligence Agencies thereof; Yes it IS true. The CIA/FBI/GCHQ/POLIS.... are all reading your posts, in fact they think it's their birthday. They love Social Networking Sites and cannot believe their luck that all this information just dropped into their laps. I have a guy on my timeline who works in Afghanistan and regularly posts his flight details and locations. Hilarious! Bet he isn't going to get promoted anytime soon. Yes! Big Brother is watching you. Now behave :)

D is for Drunk When I was a few years younger I used to phone girlfriends/exes/whoever when I had, had far to much of the Pink stuff. Then I progressed to texting, that was terrific fun and now.... Hmmm, well I think we have left the one dimensional phone/text scenario behind in favour of Social Networking.

Step One - Have far too much of the wet stuff, get bored with the crap on Telly and Log on.
Step Two - Look at all your friends profiles in a Stalkerish manner and leave inappropriate comments on their photos.
Step Three - Enter Facebook Chat at 3 a.m and talk a large load of rubbish to people you hardly know.
Step Four - Pass out and wonder, upon waking, why you are nose down on your keyboard and have 57 notifications and 18 messages in your inbox!

If you are planning a heavy night then I strongly suggest that you unplug the 'pute and disable the router!

E is for Editing Always ensure that you understand a Facebook post/comment cannot be removed. Perhaps you have just commented and made a really bad typo such as "I thought your brother was a Wanker" (replace the W with a B). Lawksamighty, you are understandedly mortified. So, it's been 20 seconds since you posted and luck has it that you have spotted your horrendous typo. 'Phew, I'll just delete it and repost' you mutter to yourself. WRONG! Every single person with a smartphone has just read your comment, in all its glory and it's only the poor saps on a PC that are wondering what the joke is about! Think! before you press that magic Enter button!

F is for Facebook The Great God Facebook has become our new religion. Some statistics for you. Facebook has over 800 million users and apparently the average user has roughly 130 friends. It's that six degrees of separation thing that fascinates me. Imagine my feelings when I managed to track down some 30 odd school friends. For those that have lived in the same town all their lives, this may be no big deal. But for me, a Donut Child (forces brat) and then an Army wife, constantly on the move, it brought a whole new dimension to my life. We all attended so many schools that I never thought I would ever see any of my friends again. Facebook has given me an enormous amount of pleasure, a smidge of grief and I think I would cry if they closed down my FB account. My father, being ex-GCHQ, shudders at the mention of FB and refuses to pose for photos if he knows I am going to post them. He is, of course, right to be wary. Social Networking is in it's infancy and only time will tell whether the information we post on our walls/timelines will be available to prospective employers/insurance companies. Note to self - Think about what you post.

G is for Girlfriends Or for that matter Friends as I already did F above! You may think that you should count all those on your wall as friends but you (and I) are sadly wrong. Many of us have subdivisions of our friends which are as follows.

a) Stalker - a person who is always on FB, has their laptop constantly by their side and comments on everything. They love to 'copy and paste' irritating messages and threaten to break your legs if you do not follow suit! This person also likes to share their entire back catalogue of fave You Tube Videos with you. You are one click away from deleting them but a perverse fascination makes you continue.
b) Friends that share nothing, only pop up once in a blue mooon and you find yourself grinding your teeth and willing them to share a bit more so you can be nosy.
c) Family members, such as older children. Only kept for their ability to curb your wild side and ensure you keep in touch with Great Aunt Batty.
d) Interesting and semi famous people who you love to have on your wall as you need the street cred they provide.
e) And finally, those that make you smile, post interesting and thoughtful comments or you fancy the pants off them and.....FB comes full circle!

Just remember if you have more 'friends' than you can count on the fingers of one hand, you are horribly deluded!

Thats it for tonight. More to follow soon.

A Tough Week

I cannot believe a week has passed since I last put keyboard to screen. It has been a bit of a toughie on the Muse front. Close friends will know the main reason, I am unable share it with you as it may hurt another female, but I will no doubt get it out of my system eventually.

One of the reasons for my angst is, the dark approaching fast. The day after tomorrow, the clocks will go back and the sun will be low, just like my mood. It will take me a couple of weeks to adjust but I am determined to do so. Next week is carefully planned - three visits to the sunbed ( I normally do two a month), hairdresser and lots of cleaning. Turfing out spiders, cleaning windows, getting rid of clutter, passing on books. It is something I do every year, not spring cleaning but divesting myself of everything unnecessary as the the winter months crush me so badly. I will not let the dark beat me this year, 'think positively, act amazingly and pull yourself through' is my current Mantra. None of this would be possible without my loving friends and family. That is the difference this year, I am finally out of my shell and embracing life. Bless you Helen for reminding me of the important things in life. Thank you Kath for being steadfast and sure. Mr S, you have been wonderful and I am so lucky to have you in my life. Okay, emotive bit over!

Some of the difficulties this week have stemmed from The Git and of course the TWMBO's. However, his teachers have been very patient with him over the last two weeks and he has been uncooperative and sullen, refusing to take on any responsibility. The mornings, in particular, have been very difficult and stressful. He refuses to shower, clean his teeth, do homework or talk to me. The turning point came last night, when I burst into tears before him. He was utterly horrified and put his (somewhat unclean arms) around me. We sat and talked and he realised how much his Ma worried about him and said he was sorry. No doubt the problems will continue, of that I am sure because an 11 year old boy, who has difficulty communicating with anyone can only snatch a moment to realise that actions have consequences. However, it was enough to calm me and enable me to renew my connection with him. I am so grateful for that moment in time.

Time to lighten up and get back to myself. Had a weird day on Wednesday. I spoke to Hyacinth (the mother who must be obeyed at all costs), she told me that my ex husband was coming down to visit older chicklets. I have not seen him for nearly 15 years.

This is due to:-

a) Me being completely impossible.
b) Him having a long relationship (plus lovely child) with rough Edinburgh woman who said she may kill me if I dared go near him!
c) Him working abroad so we were never in the same country at the same time.

I digress. I spoke to the chicklets and they assured me it would be fine to satisfy my curiosity. I drove to Sian's and tried to look my best, difficult when I could not get a hairdressers appointment that morning. Ce la Vie! Wandered in, very calm, said hello to my beautiful granddaughter and pecked him on the cheek. He looked exactly the same. Tanned, 6ft and the biggest beer belly I have ever seen! He is naturally tall and thin and he looked like he was about to give birth! Nope, not being bitchy, just telling it like it is. He seemed much more confident in himself, which is good. We went outside for a smoke and he immediately got nervous around me. I wonder why? So much water has passed under the bridge that surely things between us should not matter? I was sad to discover that he had still not forgiven me. He was married to the army and not me, which is why, when he was posted to Scotland, I refused to go and moved to Devon, where my parents were. I obviously hurt him badly and finally realise how much that has affected him. We had a picture taken together. I am glad we met. I have learned that facing your past, square on, will help you to MOVE ON.

Bit of a serious post tonight but its good to write it down. The Muse may not be herself at the moment but she is determined to sort it out.

Love and Peace to you All x

A Fine Line......

Musing tonight about the fine line between love and hate. I have been sat here tonight thinking about my true friends, thinking of past and almost, present lovers and trying to get up to 'two' hands counting them in. I have a very small number of true friends, they know who they are, but can you indulge me for a sec' when I say, 'miss you so much Nige'.

The thing is you either 'get' a person or you don't, it really is that simple. A blogger friend, Mr S, talked about the subtle difference between love and hate and I think his words make an awful lot of sense. No matter how close you are to a person, you have the capacity to do both.

What makes a wife hate her husband, when she dislikes and tolerates him 'for the sake of the children'? What makes a husband betray his wife, when he does everything he can for the kids, that are not his own in the first place, whilst his wife shows her dismay?

Just questions...... not judgements. The only thing is to sit down and evaluate all that you have achieved together. Hey, you both started out with a big dream and that dream has had it's hiccups. It is not impossible to get back on track and see this whole thing as an opportunity. Perhaps you will get back to that dream in your heart? Let's hope so.

I am a little bored at the moment, reading a lot, cleaning the house, shoving conkers in odd places as Marie, has assured me, this will keep the 'Harry The Bastards' out of the house. Erm...perhaps I ought to explain 'Harry The Bastards'. The Harry's in my house are large Hairy Spiders, dutifully named after my ex-army husband's Staff Sgt, who was called Harry, he addressed every Junior Rank as Bastard and stole all their ciggies! (Oh and he was very hairy!) By the way, I can do all the small ones, no problem! Some other quaint nicknames in my household are 'Egg and Civvies'. Well, we could never do Egg and Soldiers could we?, not with our background!

The others are my children, being beautiful in their innocence. I planted Marigolds and photographed a 3 year old James (who is now just a few days short of his 22nd birthday) in the midst of them and he told me that he loved the Garimolds (yeah, I know you will smile at that one Mr Farrington!). There are so many, but one of the funniest was spending 4 years on the North Devon Coast with The Git, who told me he hated the Ski-Gulls! (One had swooped and pinched his ice-cream!)

Muse signing off now but just a little thought to leave you with.....

All men dream but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible.
T.E. Lawrence