30 Reasons Why I Might Not Follow You Back On Twitter

1. You have #TeamFollowBack in your bio.


2. You don't reply to anyone in your tweet stream.


3. Your tweet stream is little more than a list of giveaways and sponsored posts.


4. You are hyper-focused on one topic and never stray into human communication.


5. You constantly tweet links telling me to follow you on another social media platform.


6. You only retweet other people while rarely saying anything yourself.


7. You call yourself crazy, drunk, weird, or passionate.


8. You promise your followers things if you gain a certain number of them.


9. You only tweet links to your blog or content on other sites.


10. Your bio claims that you are a social media guru or maven.


11. You promise to commit to social good activities only if your followers promote your content.


12. You are a business who sells tractors or diaper supplies or whathaveyou three thousand miles away from where I live.


13. You are heavy on the leetspeak.


14. Your bio claims that you are an expert on three or more things.


15. Your tweet stream is cluttered with app spam from the other apps you use telling me where you are, how many calories your burned running, or what your twitter stats are.


16. You make sexist, pornographic, or otherwise hate-mongering comments.


17. You have no bio whatsoever.


18. Your company bio reads like a board room mission statement.


19. Your whole stream is inspirational quotations.


20. Your bio claims to be that of an appliance, as though I want to have a relationship with a food mixer.


21. You have only two tweets to your name, but you already follow 2000 people, only 12 of whom follow you back.


22. Your avatar is still the default egg picture.


23. Your account is private and you have little to no information in your bio to help me figure out if I know you or why I would want to follow you.


24. You have multiple people tweeting from your account but never specify whose tweet is whose.


25. The majority of your tweet stream is you tweeting at celebrities and big brands.


26. You use exclamation marks in every single tweet.


27. You don't tweet in English.


28. Your bio states that you want to spread your religion.


29. Your bio focuses on you as a salesperson.


30. Your content is devoted to bitching about how other people are doing it wrong :)

25 Things On My To Do List Before I Head to Laguna Niguel to Speak At Mom 2.0 Summit

1. Look forward to getting out of Saskatchewan for a few days, because this is what our spring dumped on us last night. For serious:



2. Sand the devil callouses off my feet so that they look less hoof-like in sandals.

3. Shave my legs. I have what we Canucks refer to as "insulation" going on, but I don't think anyone's going to be complimenting me on my luxurious fur in Laguna.

4. Find the business cards with my actual name on them, because, believe it or not, I have a name other than Schmutzie!

5. Practice my talk over and over until my voice cracks.

6. Try to rework my talk, because it takes ten minutes to get through, not the seven it's supposed to.

7. Fuss over writing a sentence that ends in a preposition, because procrastination by grammar worry feels productive.

8. Laugh at the men's deodorant in Shoppers Drug Mart. BELIEVE IN YOUR SMELLF:



9. Work on my word enunciation, because maybe I can fit all ten minutes into seven minutes if I speak really fast.

10. Go clothes shopping, because I am still wearing the clothes I bought for BlogHer '10.

11. Launder all of the things.

12. Feel like I'm marching headlong into old age while organizing my vitamins and allergy medication into a days-of-the-week pill organizer.

13. Investigate my suitcase for signs of cat urine, because Onion is an evil bastard who likes to thwart my travel plans.

14. Listen to the whole of Neutral Milk Hotel's "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" album at least three times, because repetition is my lorazepam.



15. Pick up American money at the bank.

16. Play dirty words in Scrabble to amuse myself enough to forget my travel anxiety.

17. Feel the old burn of the grudge I hold against my grandmother for that time she wouldn't let me play FUCK on a triple word score for many tens of points.

18. Place a panicked call to my hairdresser. Leave a panicked message when she doesn't pick up. Panic.

19. Practice gelling my unruly sideburns behind my ears.

20. Make both Onion and the Palinode wheeze with extra squeezes, because I'll miss them when I have to sleep without them in my hotel room. The other two cats are being pissants, so they can suck it.



21. Try to keep my cool about the fact that I get to room with the inimitable Suebob.

22. Make sure I have my itinerary handy, because I have to make my way through seven airports on this one trip, and I WILL NOT FAIL.

23. Write extra poetry in advance so that I can keep up with my #365poems project while I'm travelling.

24. Write a prayer tanka while waiting for the herbal anxiety tincture to kick in:

Remember your feet.
They move on assuredly.
They know the way there.
They've borne you since your first year,
and bear what you cannot see.

25. Pack my suitcase.

Grace in Small Things: Sunday Edition #133

1. The ability to take short but decadent breaks in a hot bath with coffee and a kitty
2. The dinner party we hosted for the first time after 12 years of being married that was populated by artists and writers and speakers, and why haven't we done this sooner?!
3. Smelling a freshly opened, new tube of mascara
4. Mud, because it means that the temperature is above freezing, finally
5. The cake I am going to sneak for a late breakfast

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.