It’s fair to say that social media has become a bit of an addiction over the last few years. The first thing I do in the morning once I’m sat at the kitchen table nursing a mug of coffee and tucking into a bowl of granola is to check my Facebook feed and then take a peek at the Twitter timeline. I’m not sure why I bother much with Twitter anymore as to be honest my Twitter love has waned lately. Few of my old Twitter friends use it anymore and often or not anything I post these days results in little or no response. The trouble is, I need a lot more than the 140 odd or however many characters it is, to say what I want to say. I was told I would never pass my O level English because I just waffled on far too much. I passed it (just) but didn’t learn my lesson and still continue to waffle (as I am obviously doing right now!) Twitter and I may no longer be best friends but without it I would never have met some fabulous people, some of whom have become lovely friends who I see in real life. I would never have had the wedding I wanted without coming across great little local businesses that helped make our day so special. Nor would I have been able to name drop now and again! Sad as it may seem, I got quite a thrill to be able to drop into a conversation “Hang on a minute whilst I just respond to a tweet from this well known person!” That well known person being either someone from Great British Bake Off or a well known author or anyone else polite enough to respond to some inane comment I posted on their timeline. Sad person that I am!

After falling out of love with Twitter, I fell back in love with Facebook. Friends I actually know in real life use Facebook. Local  and not so local groups use Facebook. I can waste time doing silly quizzes on Facebook or watch clips of kittens looking cute or people doing silly things on Facebook. The list goes on. My friends think I spend far too much time on it, and yes, I probably do. It’s a guilty pleasure I have along with eating Dolly Mixtures and watching corny B rate movies.

So why its taken me so long to discover Instagram is beyond me. I had this weird idea that it was just a collection of photos and no text. All very nice, but I like to “chat” to people. Silly me for being so wrong. I’ve since discovered that you can “meet” people, follow them and not be restricted to how much you can say in a comment. I do feel a bit embarrassed though to discover that it’s often my comments in a feed that are the longest. I just can’t seem to help myself!! Would you believe that I’m actually a woman of few words away from a keyboard !

Instagram is my new love and yet it makes me feel rather inadequate. There are so many instagram images from people who are very skilled in a craft of one kind or another. Images from beautiful homes where there’s never a pile of ironing lurking in the background or dirty laundry that didn’t make it to the laundry basket (Mr R …you have been named and shamed!) There are selfie shots of people looking super stylish and wonderfully fit and slim and just annoyingly gorgeous. I’ve discovered that people like posting photos of footwear. I love these shots. I want shoes now worthy of a shoe shot, not my well worn and quite frankly scruffy work cum everyday shoes.

I get jealous of photos taken from a phone and yet still look as though they’ve been taken with an all singing, all dancing DSLR camera. Yes, I know that there are editing apps to enhance, iron out faults and trim away the bits you don’t need, but even so, why can’t a photo of a cake I’ve made look anywhere as good as someone elses. Oh for goodness sake, I seem to have developed into a green eyed Instagram monster !

Putting photo envy aside, what I’ve discovered about Instagram is that there are some very lovely people behind the lens that took those shots. I’ve noticed that there is support, friendship and encouragement within the Instagram community. I’ve only been using it for a short while and already feel very much at home there. I do worry that I’m not going to have anything to post. Am I going to go out of my way to bake a cake I don’t need to  just so that I can photograph it and then post it? Or drag Mr R for a trip somewhere to capture a shot of a field of cows? Surely the photos should be taken of a spontanious moment and not contrived? Am I missing the point?

Gosh…I have waffled on yet again, so time to stop and grab myself a cuppa. I’ll just make sure I arrange my cup and biscuit in an artistic fashion and then I can take a photo of it! Ha…only kidding!