My Sweet Tweet

My name is Liz, and I'm a Tweetaholic. Yes, you heard that right.  I know, I was completely bitter with Twitter a mere three months ago but have recently crossed to the dark side.  I finally understand what that damn Jimmy Fallon was making all the fuss about.

It all started when I went to see my psychic. We were in the middle of dishing all the dirt on my near future when she stopped abruptly.

"Hmmm..." she said, scratching her head. "Something just came to me."

"What!  What is it!" My heart started to pound.  "Am I going to win the lottery?"

"No," she said, looking at me oddly. "What the hell is Twitter?"

"Twitter?" I questioned.  And inside I was thinking, really?  I'm paying $60 an hour and we're going to talk about f*cking tweets?   "It's not important," I said.  "It's just some lame ass social networking site!"

"Really?  Because I'm being told that Twitter will be very important in your journey.  Do you tweet?"

"What! Are you sure my angels aren't referring to Facebook? I like that much better."

"Nope!" she reaffirmed. "Definitely Twitter!"

Damn, Twitter has gotten so big that they even have the afterlife promoting it?  Crazy!  I really need to get the name of their PR agency.

But my psychic has never been wrong before so I went home and dusted off my Tweetdeck.   It was a bit rocky at first, I just couldn't get into my tweet groove.  But after a while, something odd began to happen...I began to...LOVE it!

And for my tweeps who are still hatin', I get it.  At first it seems so...pointless.  I questioned whether my followers really wanted to hear about my Starbucks addiction or my love for Nick Lachey. So I would sit, fingers poised at my keyboard, staring aimlessly at my Tweetdeck.  What interesting nugget could I reveal to my followers that hadn't already been beaten to death on Facebook? And to do it in 140 characters or less? Impossible!

I was suffering from tweet performance anxiety!

But I had big RT(that's retweet for you Twitter virgins) dreams so I let my fingers fly and held my breath as my tweets were heard around the world!(or in at least four mainland states...) I even got a little crazy and participated in Twitter's version of a high five, #Follow Friday.  Our followers were growing by the hour and I became obsessed.  Lisa, who was a once-a-day tweeter at best, had no idea of the love affair Twitter and I were now having.  She would occasionally comment on our spike in followers and I feigned ignorance.  I wanted to keep the tweet love all for myself!

BUT, after one really crazy Follow Friday a few weeks ago, I was outed as the Twitter whore I had become.  Lisa, whose nickname in college was PI Spice, had finally figured out that our followers were not just showing up out of thin air.  So she installed Tweetdeck and my secret tweet life was officially over!  She wanted in on the action too.   And, well, considering the our Twitter handle is Liz and Lisa, I guess I had to oblige.

I could barely go five minutes the next week without a twext(duh, that's a text about Twitter!) from Lisa.

WTF is an RT?

What does # mean?

How do I @ someone and WTF do I say when I do?

Who is Mr. Tweet and why should I give a sh*t about him?

Why are there ten "Horny Kittys" following us?

But after a week of tryin' out her tweets, Lisa was ready for the bigtime. She was ready to tweet live about #Bachelorette!  And let me just say, it's not for amateurs.  Ripe with potential shit talk, you've gotta be sassy to score a RT from this tough crowd.  And to be honest, I wasn't sure if she was up for it.

But lucky for her, there was plenty of dramz to shittweet about on this episode, especially when the Bachelorette went on her one-on-one date with hottie Sascha.

Things seemed to be going well with Sascha and Jillian.  They had hauled ass in a Ferrari and cuddled on the couch with champagne.  It was obvious he thought the rose sitting on the table would be pinned to his lapel by the end of the night.  But after he confessed to her that he had never had his heart broken,(Hello!  commitmentphobe alert!) she sent him on a horrible walk of shame that involved public transportation. It was UGLY!

And before I even I had a chance to add my two cents,  I saw something come across the Tweetdeck that made me LOL.  A real LOL!

#bachelorette You've never had your heart broken, so I'm going to humiliate you and send you off on a bus. ha!

It was RTed almost instantly! Lisa had officially arrived! Welcome Lisa!  This mama bird is happy you finally found your own inner tweet. *wipes a tear of joy from her eye*

Click here to follow Liz and Lisa on Twitter.  Come on, you know you want to!

xoxo Liz

xoxo by Lisa

Xoxo. It means hugs and kisses or kisses and hugs depending on whom you ask. It was made popular again by Gossip Girl. (BTW-how much do we love Darota?) And it's often the way both Liz and I sign off when we're blogging, posting and emailing. So you might assume that because we use this tag line that we're affectionate people who are effusive with our emotions. Well guess again.

It's time for a confession. We may be xoxo'ers but we're not huggers and kissers by trade. In fact, Liz and I haven't truly hugged each other in, well, um, er, ever?

Not when we graduated from college.

Not at her wedding.

Not when our book was published.

Well you get the idea. Big events don't equal physical affection between Liz and Lisa.

And we don't need some $200 an hour shrink to tell us that our mechanical ways can most likely be traced back to our childhoods. Emotionally unavailable fathers much?

Case in point: Recently, Liz's 2-year-old son, Shane, hit me in the mouth with a toy golf ball and I started to cry (In my defense, the kid's got a serious arm.... and it was GNO the night before so I was also a wee bit hung over) and her daughter, Riley, was staring at me in disbelief.

Turns out, she'd never seen an adult woman cry; Her mommy, the robot, had never shed a tear. Well, except for when Chris Daughtry was unexpectedly voted off American idol.

But the funny thing is, we may be The Tin Man meets Short Circuit with each other, but with the men in our lives, children and most animals--we have no problem saying I love you and giving kisses and hugs. Maybe we do need that shrink after all?

To illustrate our stiltedness even further, I'll allow you to be a fly on the wall for a recent conversation about Liz's brother, Brian.

LISA:  "How's Brian?"

LIZ:  "Okay, um, yeah, well we're taking it day by day..."

LISA: "Ok, well, you don't have to talk about anything you don't want to talk about..."

LIZ: "Um, yeah, well, okay. Let's change the subject..."

LISA:  "Om, well, okay then... Did you see that crazy Top Model stampede footage on Perez?"

So I'm sure you can understand my surprise and confusion when after TWENTY-TWO YEARS of robotic communication, Liz recently xoxo'd--me.  I mean, I never even get as much as a "best" and now she's xoxo-ing me? WTF?

I emailed her back and jokingly asked if she meant the xoxo for someone else but I already knew the answer-clearly she'd made a mistake. And I had my next blog topic!

But had it been a flub or was it more of a Freudian slip? Suddenly it all came crashing back...like the morning after you hook up with a one-eyed Jack. (True story that I'll save for another post!)

On New Year's Eve she'd left me a message and said she *gulp*  loved me.

But the next morning, when I logged onto Facebook and saw the  bleary-eyed pictures of her escapades on the Queen Mary (BTW, Liz, the Queen Mary, really?) I chalked it up to the fact she was hammered.

But still, I didn't think I'd ever heard those three little words from her before...were we, um, ready for that?

Was she getting soft on me? I thought about possible explanations. She did turn 35 this year...was that it? Or could it be all that spiritual enlightenment sh** she'd been yapping about lately that I prayed was a phase? Was she "changing" our unsaid arrangement that had been working really well for us?

Because the thing is, it's not like we're a couple of stone cold beyotches. I'm proud to say that our friendship has lasted over two decades. And in that time, there's only been one girl fight. (If a bent thumb even qualifies?)

So in honor of almost a quarter life of knowing each other, here are some of our unwritten rules of how our friendship works and how we show each other we care.  (They're all kind of back handed & sarcastic, but hey, that's how we roll.)

As long as I don't call or text her after 11PM, she's always there for me :)

As long as she doesn't call me at work, I've always got her back.  (Work Lisa isn't always a walk in the park!)

Pre-coffee discussions of any kind are only in a case of an emergency.

We're like family. (Well, if you don't count the fact my dad asked her who she was when she tried to friend him on Linkdin.) Bob Steinke's real sorry, I promise.

Her kids call me Auntie Lisa. (Well, me and like 25 others, but hey, I'll take it.)

Liz has logged enough hours counseling me after my many, many break ups that I think she could qualify for an MFT. (Let's put it this way-- I know she's thanking one of those spiritual enlightenment people of hers that I FINALLY met Matt!)

The bottom line is that when you've known someone since they had a unibrow and thought it was cool to drink Strawberry Boones in the back of a pick up truck, it goes without saying that overt affection or not, we are BFF's.

So, in honor of getting older (My 36th birthday is March 30th-hint, hint, hint everyone!) and hopefully wiser, Liz, I accept your xoxo and I raise you an xo!

xoxoxo!