When Someone Breaks Up With You VIA Social Media.

Aahhh, technology.

It's a wonderful thing, isn't it? With the click of a button I can keep up to date with everyone I've ever met in the history of the world. Ever.

And I really do keep up with everyone I've ever met ever. There's a mental checklist I go through as I scroll through my friends list, and I was sad to see one of my best friends from high school hadn't updated in a while.

Then, she followed me on twitter, and I was thrilled! I @messaged her right away, only to have her promptly unfollow me.

I've been dumped, ladies and gentlemen.

Dumped, I tell you, and I don't know why.

She's not the first, either. And surely not the only person I've ever unceremoniously crossed off my friends list without a second thought. I do admit, my feelings are slightly hurt, I absolutely did love this person, and part of me wants to go into intense cyber stalking mode and track her down and find out what the heck I did wrong. Is it the politics? Am I boring? Do I over-share? I do, don't I?

I'll forebear. No cyber-stalking for me.

Maybe we've just outgrown each other, a phenomenon that would have have happened naturally without the advent of facebook and twitter. Twenty Five years ago (this number has grown exponentially since I started typing it..first it was ten, then twenty...I'm SO old.) there was no way to locate someone on the internet.

Now, we can locate them, and love them, or hate them, or tolerate them for the rest of our lives if we so choose. Is it healthy? Who knows!

It gave me a kind of sadness that was easily nursed with a bowl of homemade chocolate pudding, and a rambling sent out to the universe blog post. I really did like her.

Things were easier before all this social media stuff, weren't they?

Why People Stop Following You.

There's a hugely narcissistic element in internet life. Me! Me! Me! Facebook, your posts are about you, you tweet what you are doing, you stumble things you like, not necessarily that you think your best friend's sister's cousin will like.

You spend the day updating people about you. We all do it. I like to read my friend's status updates with greedy eyes...it helps with the fact that I'm home with two kids locked in a house on a snowy Saturday, but I've learned ages ago that I'm not an average bear.

I LIKE not being average.

I have seen one or two tweets about people getting their feelings hurt when people stop following them and I wanted to touch on that.

It's pretty simple.

Shut up. That's it. You talk too freaking much. If you've tweeted so many times in the last five minutes that I scroll through two whole screens of your tweets, Unfollow.

If you email me blog updates more than once a day...unsubscribe.

If you post more than ten times a day doing five thousand product reviews and tweet them each six times, Unfollow.

IF you don't follow me back? Unfollow. This is a relationship-I'm not your worshiper.

If your website crashes my computer more than once you could be giving away the Taj Mahal and I wouldn't show up. So stop with all the javascript trojans already. (You know who you are.)

See, it's that easy! Have a little respect for your readers. We like what you have to say, that's why we followed you to begin with. Now, give us a little respect back, and we'll both be happy!