Meat and potatoes.  Bread and butter.  Hollywood and Vine.  Abercrombie and Fitch.  Barnes and Noble.  Britney and white trash.  Brandi and coffee.  I, too, love two things so very, very much that they are inseparable in my mind, which makes them inseparable for all time.

One of these things is cheese.

Cheese, how I love you.  You are the tastiest, most delicious, most glorious curdled coagulation ever invented.  You are delectable on sandwiches, in soups, on a salad, all alone, paired with wine, coupled with beer, as a meal, as a snack, as a treat, as dessert!  You are the reason that I will never, ever achieve veganism in this lifetime.  Because I am so in love with you, cheese.  You’re the one that I want.  Cheese, if you were a human being, we’d have almost nothing in common, but at least we’d have a good time together.  I mean that in a PG-sort of way, I swear.

I don’t have anything more to say about cheese, really.  I just thought you should know how I feel.

The other thing I love is monkeys.

Oh, hello there, lil’ monkey.  YOU WEALLY CUTE!

When I say “monkeys,” I really mean “primates.”  I only use those two words interchangeably because I have creative license to do so, and no one can stop me.

And no, it’s absolutely not okay that monkeys/chimpanzees/orangutans/gorillas/lemurs/tamarins are that cute.  In fact, it’s completely unfair.  The whole animal kingdom really should revolt, actually.  If I was an elephant, I’d throw a very hysterical fit immediately.  And stomp my big fat feet a whole lot.  If I was a giraffe, I wouldn’t even sign on to the next iteration of The Jungle Book unless the producers made sure that all members of the incredibly lovable primate population were excluded from the cast.  It’s not right.  How can one animal usurp so much wonderfulness in the world?  It’s completely, ridiculously biased.  And unjust.  And weally, weally cute.

Anyway, well, do you know that certain foods contain palm oil, and palm oil plantations actually contribute to the extinction of orangutans?  Yes, that is true.  It’s a crisis.  What’s even truer is that many of the foods that you will consume or distribute – particularly Halloween candies at this time of year, ahem -  contain this dastardly palm oil nonsense.  So educate yourself.  Don’t buy Halloween candies with palm oil in them.  Just don’t.  I said don’t.  There’s a lot of candy out there; you won’t miss a few cavities here and there, I promise.  This handy dandy list will help you chocolatize and sugarize the kiddos without snuffing out the most amazing animal that the jungle has to offer.

Okay, look. I’ll level with you.  If I’m ever going to cuddle with orangutans, you’re gonna have to work with me here.  You gotta make sure they stay alive long enough for me to get to Borneo or Sumatra, and that’s not going to happen right now.  Not unless National Geographic plucks me out of obscurity for my awesome journalism and photography prowess (hola, NatGeo, I’m waiting!).  Since my cellie hasn’t blown up with NatGeo on the other end yet, lay off the Three Musketeers and Dum Dums this Halloween, you dig?  Pull your weight in my quest to hug an orangutan.

Okay.  And that’s all I really have to say.  Aloha!

DISCLAIMER WHICH SHOULD’VE GONE AT THE BEGINNING OF THIS POST: This post is entirely incoherent, highly irrelevant to a whole lot of everything, and generally worth reading because it’s as ADD as you are.  Please read with caution.  Take your meds.  No other safeguards will be provided.  Carry on.

Photo by one of my favorite Schipulites, QCait.

A week ago, I turned 30.  No, not tricks or vinyl records or seasons, mind you.  Years of age, that is.  I am 30 years old.

30 is a particularly perplexing and unique milestone, but not for the reasons you may think.  No, turning 30 is much, much more than a single, solitary day of the year or the number of candles on a cake that will sit in your fridge until you’re 40.  I knew that 30 – the build-up and the associated mental mayhem, not the actual date, you see – had been hurtling toward me for quite some time now.  I thought I could navigate my way through the accompanying storm a-brewin’ with ease.  After all, like Aaliyah said (and famously adhered to), “age ain’t nothin’ but a number.”  Right?

But I was wrong.  I couldn’t bushwhack my way through the impending dread, uncertainty, and discontent that would accompany the gale-force winds, and, even if I did, try as I might, I couldn’t locate the checkpoints.  And to be perfectly honest, you are simply unable to enjoy much of anything about 29 with the monster of 30 looming on the horizon.

As soon as I conquered the salmonella that dominated the arrival (and departure) of my 29th birthday, I was already three million cognitive steps beyond the last year of my 20s.  Indeed, there’s a great process of self-stock that you undertake when the end of anything is nigh, and the steep cliff of an era in my life was no exception.

I’d begun my 20s as an incurable, indecisive student, then passed the middle of the decade praying that Oprah would pluck me out of obscurity and near-poverty to magically erase my debt, with the end of my 20s spent wishing that higher education didn’t have a price tag or a recommended cessation point.  The 29th year of my life was like a giant magnifying glass for all the missteps, disappointments, and shortcomings that manifested themselves in my 20s.  It was safer underneath that lens – stagnating, rotting, and becoming entirely too comfortable – but the damaging glare was unbearable.

In between 19 and 30, there were countless weddings, mortgages, births, promotions, and relocations, wherein I mostly watched curiously and in a state of complete vexation from the outside (except for the relocations part, that is; I’m pretty adept at that).  And even though I knew that we’re technically supposed to be capable of growing up and being adults, I still felt like everyone was playing dress up with their parents’ clothes and roles in this giant game of life.

Could we really be old enough to commit eternity to one another in holy matrimony?  I was still tossing out last year’s model of my beloved camera as soon as the newest one was released, and zigzagging across the country every two months (or so it seemed) to set up an entirely new existence.  Were we really mature enough to be responsible for the upbringing, health, and happiness of another human being that was 100% dependent upon us?  I could barely keep my cat flea-free and without matted feces on his rear.

When I used to play Barbies with my sister, all of my Barbies would always die off by their 30th birthdays.  It wasn’t because I was necessarily a macabre youngster or anything fatalistic like that.  But to me, life ended when you turned 30.  The age of 30 was simply the absolute stop to everything good that could possibly happen to an individual in his or her lifetime.

And now I’m 30.

And, for that matter, Barbie’s 50.

I feel that this number – 30, I mean – should somehow suddenly make sense of everything now.  Either that, or I should lay down next to Loving You, Dream Date, and Day-To-Night Barbies in the graveyard of 30 year-olds.  I realize I’m probably putting too much pressure on a mere turning of the calendar page, and yet, I feel that if any age deserved pressure, this would be the one.

I feel like I’m the only one left that still doesn’t get it.  For example, there’s a man animatedly dreaming next to me, and he calls me his girlfriend.  I call him my boyfriend.  Apparently this is normal for a woman of my age (I’d posit a guess that women even younger than me have boyfriends, too), and yet, I still don’t know what the hell I’m doing with any of that.  I really don’t.  But I am trying.

And there’s more.  My company recently hosted a conference, and I had the opportunity (and privilege) to speak to attendees on large and small scales.  Some of these attendees stopped me in the halls to thank me for the information I provided in my presentation and to praise a job well done. But still, I don’t see myself as the purveyor of any great knowledge, nor the deserved recipient of any such commendation.  I’m just a chick who does what she does.

To me, I’m still 19.  I don’t know why 19, but I haven’t gotten any older in my own head than that.  And a girl of 19, such as I am, is certainly not equipped to be a wife, a mother, a homeowner, or an expert.  That’s poppycock.

Strangely, I am not actually 19.  I am 30.  I’m not sure how, but my birth certificate doesn’t lie.

It goes without saying that I have a lot of expectations for the onset of this thing, this 30.  Supposing my 30s will thank me for all of the confusion and tomfoolery that characterized my 20s, that is.  Experience is a great teacher.  Now I simply have to take it all and learn from it.

But I really just hope that it all starts to make sense sometime soon. And that it clicks.  And that I “get it.”  And that I am at least able – in some small part – to figure things out. ‘Cause now that I’m 30, I intend to make it to the ripe ol’ age of Barbie.  And then some.  But I’ll never survive if I keep at it the way I did in my 20s.

Barbie, look out for me.  I’m going to follow your line.

I have no desire to explain where I’ve been since June.  In fact, if I did explain where I’ve been since June, then I think I should change the title of this blog from “I’m Awesome” (which is still entirely true, mind you) to “I’m Full of Awesome Excuses.”  Which is also technically true, since everything that comes out of my mouth, ends up on paper, or is posted to the web due to my creation is, summarily, really awesome.

Was I going somewhere with this?

I want to claim I was talking about how awesome I am, but I fear that would be erroneous.  I suppose I was talking about how I have absolutely nothing to say about not posting on this blog since June.  I could say things, I just don’t want to.  Right?  I can do that.  It’s my blog.  Seriously, who’s reading this blog anyway?  I mean, obviously I’m completely full of myself; that’s why I have a blog.  But no one is actually consuming this drivel.  Most of you get enough of my buffoonery in person.  Why would you want to devote your precious free time to swallowing mouthfuls of my…you know, my stuff?

Dammit.  You fucking love me.

I needed to throw in “fuck,” because this post was entirely too much.  Am I writing for a G-rated audience or what?  Fuck that.  And fuck this.  Fucking shit.  Fuck ‘em.  Fuck it.  Fuck it all!  Man.  That makes me feel so much fucking better.

I am still not sure what my point was.

Anyway, so, wow!  Is this blogging thing cool or what?  Yeah, fuck.  This shit’s hard.  Remember when I used to have nothing to do at work and I’d not-so-covertly blog all day about how terrible my job was?  Oh, and boys.  I also blogged about boys.  That part was better than the work part.  Most of you didn’t know me then.  But getting paid to blog was cool.  Not that that was in my job description.  Yeah right.  But that’s exactly what I did.  Is that what I do now?  I dunno.  Sorta.  Except it’s technically okay now.  Well, not blogging all day.  But fucking around on the Internet all day is.  Because now it’s like, a skill set and shit.  Just think – all that screwing around on MySpace and Blogger in the olden days actually helped land the gig I call “a living” now.  Man, life is great.

Is that last paragraph going to get me in trouble?

Why exactly am I writing like this?  Is it because I so desperately wanted to throw in the word “fuck” one more time for posterity?  Hahahaha, I said “fuck” again.  It’s like I’m fuckrolling you.

Dude, I’m so out of touch.  I don’t write enough anymore.  Wait a minute.  Yes, I do.  So now I have no excuse.

Fuck.

Fuckrolling 15, Fuck 0.

Shit. This is going to drive up traffic to my site, but for all the wrong reasons.  Ew.

I was going somewhere with this, wasn’t I?

Truthfully, I probably wasn’t.  Fuck.  I’m so irrelevant.  I should, like, something.  Yeah.  I’ll something sometime really soon.

Drugs?  What drugs?

I’m about to rip a man a new asshole.  No, wait, I hate that saying.

I’m about to dissect a man from the outside in.  Errr.  I’m not gonna do that either.  That’s kinda too Trent Reznor.  And is that even possible?  I do not want to fuck you like an animal in any way, shape, or form, however.

I swear these thoughts are all linked.  I promise.  They all make sense to someone that isn’t you.  Perhaps it’s me.  Perhaps not.

This entire post would be better in tweets.  Sigh.

So, do you think it is considered “progress,” per se, when you finally come to terms with the fact that every single one of your individual thoughts really does fit into 140 characters or less?

Do you think it’s considered “progress” when you finally come to terms with the fact that every single one of your individual thoughts really does fit into 140 characters or less?

Is it considered “progress” when you finally come to terms with the fact that every single one of your individual thoughts really does fit into 140 characters or less?

Is it “progress” when you come to terms with the fact that every single one of your thoughts really does fit into 140 characters or less?

Is it “progress” when you realize that every single one of your thoughts really does fit into 140 characters or less?

Is it “progress” when you realize that all of your thoughts really do fit into 140 characters or less?

Is it “progress” when your thoughts really are 140 characters or less?

Listen, Russian spammers, I know I haven’t been posting a lot at all lately, but this blog is not defunct, so lay off the vodka binge for a second.

Yes, this is my feeble attempt to make yet another excuse for not posting.  Wait, have I made a genuine excuse before?  It doesn’t matter.

I’m so bored with my own excuses that I’m not even going to bother making any.  But I will make lists.  Because lists are nice, and everyone loves a good list, right?  Oh, and lists aren’t excuses.  They’re awesome.  Just like me.

Top 11 Reasons Why Fayza Hasn’t Been Blogging Here

1. She’s scheming. Okay, that might be a given, but still, she’s definitely scheming.  And she doesn’t wanna tell you about it.  Na-na-na-boo-boo.
2. She’s un-fattening herself. She’s been training for an adventure race with an adventure racing team.  It’s all very adventurous.  And frankly, she loves it and wishes it would take up even more of her time than it already does.  That isn’t sarcasm, actually.
3. She’s a tool. She’s adopted a third-person-only method of addressing herself, but she’s not that smart, so it gets really confusing sometimes.
4. She’s replaced I’m Awesome. with greener pastures. So, okay, not entirely true, but she is blogging over at the Houston Press (yes, a real, live, legitimate publication, can you believe it?) as its new social media columnist.
5. She’s a slacker. She’s trying to pull her weight over on the Schipul blog.  Because she doesn’t work hard enough at Schipul as is.
6. She buys into the hype ’cause Oprah told her to. She can’t blog from her BlackBerry very easily at all, but she can tweet from it (so she does that instead).  What a sheep.
7. She sucks now. She misses being a real snaggletoothed jackoff, like she was on her old blog (which she will not reveal to you).
8. She’s boring. She has nothing interesting to say.  Okay, this one’s a bold-faced, Arial-fonted lie.
9. She wants you to miss her. What, something wrong with good ol’ fashioned beggin’ for attention?
10. She’s been livin’ up life as a $30,000 millionaire. Jetsetting to San Francisco, like, every other weekend.  And you know it.
11. She’s pretty sure this blog is all about her. And what a vain concept that is.

As if anything further needs to be said, well, I’m sayin’ it.  I’m going to stop taking this space on the interwebs so seriously and let my hair down.  All six inches of it.  And maybe go without underwear while wearing a skirt on a windy day, too.  Life’s too short to care so much, isn’t it?

I’m taking suggestions for making this blog more interesting (subject to my overarching veto, of course).  ‘Cause gawd only knows we need another blogger out there with absolutely nothing to say.

Although I’ve been no better than mute here as of late, I promise you I haven’t fallen into the depths of contented and disengaged nothingness (otherwise known as this American life?) just yet. Rather, I’ve simply halfheartedly moved on to more convenient, lazier channels of communication for demonstrating my social media prowess (and after I use the word “prowess,” I do believe it’s required that I growl.  Rowr.).

Behold, the recorded webinar!

Check it out – the following are two webinars I’ve done – one pertaining to social media in general, one focusing on Twitter in particular – to assist your average maverick Joe the Plumber from Main Street in dipping a toe into the social media bailout waters.

Man, actually, scratch that. Enough of the overused phraseology already!  I’ve grown unbelievably weary of the saying “dipping a toe” into anything. What do you get out of just sticking a toe in?  A shiver up your spine?  A saltwater-flavored phalange?  A wet toe?  I scoff at that!  I want the contemporary Everyman to thrust a gleaming knife through the heart of social media, and then draw it out again triumphantly, dripping with social media blood!

Oh yeah. Now that’s more like it.  And lick it clean, too, why dontcha.  For good measure.  And because it’s not polite to waste.

I swear I’m only this macabre when it comes to social media.

I am a new woman.  Yes, a totally, completely changed lady.  Can you tell?  Whaaa, you can’t tell? What if I spin around in a circle?  Throw my hip out like this?  Pivot on my left instead of my right foot?  Now do you see it?

Pfft.  I’m different, man, I am!  To me, it’s quite obvious.  You see, from here on forward, I am no longer writing as a SXSW (that’s South by Southwest, to those of you that don’t speak acronymic geek) virgin.  Yessir!  A mere weekend ago, my SXSW cherry was popped.  Pop!  Just like that.  It didn’t hurt at all, even though it was my first time (what a relief!).  In fact, it felt quite good.  And I’d do it again in a heartbeat.

While the omnipresent Jeremiah may have compiled some killer tips for doing SXSW on the cheap, and the adorable Cindy Li has authored some kickbutt survival tips for doing SXSWi right, all I’ve got for you are my own accounts of what I’ve dubbed “Mardi Gras for Geeks.”  And not all of them are of importance to the masses.  My failed attempt at universality, for shame!  However, they do hold, at the very least, minimal entertainment value for at least 57.8% of you.  If we (wait, who’s “we”?) weren’t being difficult, we could call them “Lessons Learned,” but gosh, how boring would THAT be?  It might be pretty darn boring.  Dammit.

So, without further ado, here are Fayza’s Top 20ish SXSWi Takeaways:

1. Sure, panels are good.  Some panels are even great.  But spending quality time meeting people outside the panels? Even better!
2. If you’re gonna hang out at the Convention Center for an extended period of time (as you probably should), the TechSet Bloggers Lounge is the place to be.  For serious.  I only wish I’d known that before the last day.
3. Except, if you’re gonna do that, you must also know this rule:  Do. Not. Sit. At. The. Chair.  Above. The. Power. Strip.  A.R.G.H.
4. Well, helloooooooo, techie boys!  Where’d you come from and when’d you get so kayooooooote? I’d take one of you over a doctor or lawyer or famous actor any day.  Can you say “yummy“?  CALL ME!  Ahem.
5. It doesn’t matter WHAT you’re wearing, except that you’re wearing comfortable shoes.  Wearing a dress?  Wear comfortable dress shoes.  Wearing a camouflage muumuu?  Wear comfortable camouflaged muumuu shoes.  You’re going to do more walking than you ever dreamed possible, you’ll be on your feet longer than you’d imagined when you packed your suitcase, and you’ll only spend time in your hotel room getting ready and sleeping.  And getting ready and sleeping will take up about 0.000018% of your entire stay in Austin.
6. Piggybacking on that, SXSW certainly isn’t the time to catch up on your sleep.  Nor is it the time to eat healthy, start your detox program, worry about hygiene, complain about the weather, chill out, or decide that you want to be moody and independent.
7. You see that big escalator at the corner entrance of the Convention Center?  It does not go to the 3rd Floor.  No, not at all.  And that elevator over there?  Well, it only goes to the 3rd Floor, but not the 4th.  But you can take the outside staircase to get to the 4th Floor.  Or is it the 3rd Floor?  Hey, has anyone seen the 2nd Floor at all?
8. It’s pretty effing cute to see guys getting all fluttery and stuff about Guy Kawasaki and Tony Hsieh.
9. Unless you have a lot of time to spare, don’t walk down the street with “A. Hughes” and his camera.  If you must, go to a town where it is guaranteed that he knows positively no one, and where there are absolutely zero pretty girls in sight.  Trust me on this one.
10. Adding, “That’s what she said!” after, um, almost everything remotely suggestive never, ever gets unfunny.
11. Oh yeah, and “server rack,” too.
12. What’s Twitter?
13. Did you know that you can cook Spaghetti-Os in a coffee maker?  Yum.  Breakfast.
14. You wanna meet people at SXSW?  You’d better get yourself to some parties.  Or hurdle chairs to get to the panelists before they call security on you.  Or call you “cheap.”
15. If there’s ever a mass button disappearance in America (and I mean “buttons,” as in the ones with the pins attached to the back), I have located their secret bunker.  They’re all hiding out on the tables at the SXSW Film & Interactive Trade Show.  Talk about buttons like whoa!  Even Joey would’ve whoa-d.
16. Maggie wore her hair differently at SXSW.  No one noticed.
17. So yeah, it kinda sucked not having an iPhone.  It was the equivalent of everyone wearing satin undies, and I was the only one sportin’ cotton.  With dinosaurs on it (okay, actually, that’s kinda cool).  Until AT&T proved to the geekiest throng in the world how badly its service actually sucks, making my incredibly uncool Verizon Wireless BlackBerry look pretty damn sexy when I got data and voice service, like, everywhere.
18. Apparently, my vocal chords aren’t a fan of heavily imbibing for four nights straight.  What started off as a sexy morning voice quickly devolved into an enviable smoker’s rasp.  Pfft.  Lightweights.
19. There is some brilliant technology on its way into the mainstream, my friends – lemme tell you! – but my favorite, by far, was Empressr.  A browser-based, rich media presentation tool?  And it’s FREE?!  Swoon!  I’m in love!  Marry me?
20. If you become internet-famous enough, you, too, can land yourself on an Internet All-Stars Trading Card.  Ahem.  Yikes.
21. All of Austin’s bars are outside.  This doesn’t bode well when it is, um, FREEZING.
22. Err, clearly there are parts of #6 to which I did not abide.
23. I really must learn how to spin boobie tassels.
24. Dear Mr. Boss Man, if we ever, you know, needed to open, like, a satellite office in Austin, I would take one for the team and help establish a Schipul branch there.  You know, ’cause I’m, like, a team player ‘n all.

Why, hello.  HELLO HI!

Okay, we have to talk about it.

Being the bashful blogger that I am, I awoke early with the specific intent that I was going to write a blogpost.  You know, seeing that I haven’t done that since December (I’m ducking your gunfire as we speak).  Err.  Okay, okay, you caught me; that’s a total lie.  I was rudely shaken from peaceful slumber by my feline companion’s mewing, which, when unanswered, graduated to howling, which devolved into sucking on my hair and kneading his claws into my head (yes, this behavior is quite regular for him). I decided to jostle myself into the real world by hoisting my laptop onto the bed, and almost immediately, he fell asleep next to me.  He’s been completely silent for about, oh, let’s say, an hour?  That’s about as long as I’ve been up, anyway.

Sucker.

So instead of dwelling on the fact that my waking hours are likely to completely suck based upon the fact that I haven’t had a restful night of sleep for about a week, I decided to turn lemons into lemonade (yum, lemonade sounds great right now!) and write (wouldn’t it be great if the expression was “turning milk into cheese”?  I think I like that one better; I’m going to use it from here on out).

Ahem.  Except, like, I can’t.

You see, my brain is broken.  I’m blaming Twitter.  ‘Cause there has to be something to blame, and it’s pretty much required to be some sort of social media that psychologists will argue is changing my traditional social behaviors for the worse.  I mean, I only think in brief, bite-sized, followable quips anymore!  Everything else worth saying is either retweetable, overheard, or a link to a website!  And it’s amazing that the limits on what I have to say are 140 characters or less!  I know, it’s a Christmas miracle!

Woof.

I’ll be the first to admit that I pretty much suck at this blogging thing.  I didn’t always suck, but now, I do suck.  Sure, I have topics to write about.  I mean, I returned from the fun-and-learning-filled time warp that was SXSWi on…um, was it yesterday?  No, no, never mind, it doesn’t matter.  The point is, I have plenty to say about that, but perhaps not the time to gather my thoughts.  Or perspective?  Errr, perhaps not the motivation to gather my thoughts.  Oh, oh, and I know, there’s always time for me to further litter the blogosphere with my ideas on social media!  Because there’s not enough out there already!

Why am I lying so much this morning?  Any constructive thoughts that need to be written about have been completely overtaken by thoughts of boys.  Particular boys, theoretical boys, unspecific boys, but there you have it – boys, boys, boys.  Hey 30, is that you a-knockin’ or what?

Crap.  This is going downhill fast.  And my boss is going to read this.  And he’s going to shake his head, and maybe his cheeks will turn a little red.  O HAI BOSSMAN!

The truth is, the tunnels leading in and out of my head are pointing in a million, cajillion, bazillion different directions right now (why does this feel like a cop-out email that I’ve written to my friends back in Ohio when I can’t make it to their baby showers?).  So, think of this as a placeholder.  No, no, actually, think of me as the cute, wholesome, strangely attentive frat boy that diligently kept supplying you beers at that kegger (you know the one), who graciously got you wasted and encouraged and supported your idea of dancing on the couches topless while making out with your sorority sister,  who offered his bed to you when you were too drunk to make it back to the dorms (with sheets that hadn’t been washed since his freshman year, and was he a fifth-year senior already?), and who left the house for “class” before you could even roll over to ask him where your socks and underwear landed.  You’ll tell everyone it was love.

Moral of the story?  I’m using you, dear readers.  I’m using you and this blogpost to get my blogging groove back.

Was it as good for you as it was for me?

Social media this, social media that.  Are you tired of hearing about “social media” yet?  Well, if you are, my heart aches for you in advance.  With the financial chasms in this country deepening and marketing budgets being the first to get slashed, expect social media to go the route of Icarus until it reaches its tragic meeting with the sun.

These days, it seems like everyone – theoretically speaking, at least – is doing social media.  As a result, there are dime-a-dozen self-anointed social media “experts” everywhere.  Everywhere, I tell you!  Overindulged “social media gurus“  (the less faint of heart despise the word “guru,” yet don’t hesitate to describe themselves with it) navigate the sinewy entrails of the interwebs, flaunting and strutting their proverbial feathers for anyone who’ll pay at least a backwards glance.  “Look at me, I’m a social media expert!  I know everything there is to know about social media!  I have the answers!  I set the tone!”

There are gobs and gobs of ambitious and savvy Internet users out there – cutting-edge marketers, calculated enterpreneurs,  impatient get-rich-quicks, critical executives, curious public relations personnel, bushy-tailed college graduates, tentative self-employeds, and so on – confidently asserting that they know social media.  Hell, I’m pretty much one of them!  We’re all out there claiming to be the definitive voice on social media.  Asserting our opinions like the deciphering Rosetta Stone to those social media hieroglyphics.  We’ve articulated how-tos, promulgated guidelines, set the acceptable standards.  We’ve engaged each other in the “echo chamber” via self-serving, back-patting discussions.  But by and large, social media “experts” really love to create copious – which, translated, means often indigestible and inconceivable – amounts of rules, rules, rules, rules.  Because, well, you know.  We social media folk know what social media is and we know what social media expertise is all about.

But c’mon – who’s really an “expert” at this, anyway?  An “expert” is defined at the core as someone “with a high degree of skill in or knowledge of a certain subject.”  Fair enough.  So those of us that “specialize” in “social media strategy” or “social media consulting” are then de facto “experts,” right? 

Really? For a subject that’s been around for such a short period of time that’s ever-evolving (as in hourly and daily – this is hyper-time, baby), just what out there can we possibly be “experts” on, exactly?  What’s the subject matter?  Okay, what’s the subject matter now? Even the ever-influential Malcolm Gladwell claims that we need at least 10,000 hours of dedicated practice to really master a subject area or skill – that’s 20 hours a week for 10 years, folks.  Has there even been enough time to become an “expert” on these tools, in these conversations, in these interactions that are always, always, always changing, and never, ever, ever constant?

So I ask again: Are we the experts?  I’ll speak for myself; I’m certainly no social media “expert.”  I didn’t go to social media school and my Juris Doctor specialization certainly wasn’t in social media.  I’ve learned everything I know through an insatiable enthusiasm for the trends, ascent, and usage diversification of social media, becoming a heavy user of the social media tools,  and through trial and error.  So is it still acceptable, although I’ve had no formal education on “social media,” that I hold myself out as a social media “expert”?

What do we – we, the self-proclaimed social media strategists, the social media consultants, the social media advisors, the social media evangelists – what do we really know, anyway?

Frankly, we know as much as anyone.  And that “anyone” is any of you.

Dearest random Facebook user, darling random Twitterer, querido random Flickr user – you specialize in social media just as much as I do, just as much as he does, just as much as we do.  You’re out there in Social Media Land, just like me, experiencing and experimenting with these tools and platforms daily, letting them transform your careers, your relationships, your leisure time, your hobbies, your social calendars – your very lives, at their most fundamental.  You’re in it, just like me, in the thick of it, having the conversations of Jane Everywoman and Joe Everyman, fueling the engines of social media.  You have no desire to analyze behaviors or value or ROI.  You don’t care how to participate in and massage conversations for marketing purposes.  You don’t care about tracking your brand.  And yet, you are what makes this whole thing go.  You are social media!

So then how can there be rules for this when the very nature of social media depends upon the spontaneity and unpredictability of human interactions, human conversations, and human experiences?  Are there rules for that?  Well?

Let’s extrapolate for a second here.  What rules govern your offline interactions with people?  For instance, do you consult a handbook before you lean over your cubicle wall to greet your co-worker?  Do you conduct extensive online research before going to the bar for drinks and idle banter with your friends?  Chances are, you probably don’t, because hard and fast rules don’t permeate your everyday relationships.  Not with flesh and blood, anyway.  Unless, that is, you’ve deemed the generally held notions of common decency “rules” by which you conduct your daily activities.  Normally, you’ll find such nonsecular edicts buried deep within the foundation of many holy institutions.  But for those of us that aren’t particularly religious, these mere proposals for human conduct are not transcribed nor housed in some public repository for all to see and admire, nor are they universally honored.  Besides, it’s a matter of course that these sorts of behaviors are subject to wild variations in interpretation from individual to individual.

Social media, my friends, is a study in sociology, at best.  It’s merely “an effort to use systematic methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human societies and human social activity.”  And it is chaos, at worst.  This is the humanity, and its actions cannot be prescribed, dictated, or controlled.  Social media, at all times, is a snapshot of the human condition.

Why?  Because there are no rules in social media.  There are norms.  There are customary behaviors.  There are habitual behaviors.  There are recommendations and suggested guidelines.  But there aren’t rules.

We “social media” folk study you.  We study your interactions, we study how you relate to each other in the sphere that geeks have most aptly dubbed “social media.”  We want to know what you do before you do it, so that we can say, “Yeah, we knew you were going to do that!  Because we know you!  We know what you did, why you did it, and we know what you’ll do next!  It’s social media!”  It’s amazing we social media folk have any breath left after proclamations such as those.

But fellow social media “experts,” we’re not the teachers here.  We’re the students.  Do you realize how much the public at large is educating us about our very own craft?  About our area of “expertise”?  We are learning our jobs from them!

Those people out there, blogging and using Facebook and YouTube and Flickr and Twitter?  They don’t call this stuff “social media,” kids.  When I tell people what I do, I usually have to say, “I help companies and organizations use Facebook and Twitter to market their businesses and interact with their clients.”  Because if I go into any additional details, I run the risk of alienating anyone that isn’t in the industry.  You know, those people for whom we created this term, “social media,” remember?  Yes, them.  The meat and potatoes of “social media.”

Yes, we social media “experts” are heavy users and early adopters of the social media applications about which we preach and gush.  Yes, we take part in the conversations swirling around us.  Yes, we push out well-written, meaningful content (which probably isn’t of interest to anyone else but us, but that’s outside the scope of this post).

But who creates this?  Who makes it so?  Who makes it “wrong,” for example, to follow someone on Twitter and then, after you follow them back, you’re unfollowed immediately?  Who makes a social pariah out of the users that are constantly intruding with invitations to Vampire Wars and Lil’ Green Patch applications on Facebook?  Who makes it “wrong” to fail to credit the usage of another Flickr user’s picture in a blog post?  Who makes those practices “norms”?  Who ushers them into “custom”?

Not me.  Not Chris Brogan.  Not Shannon Paul.  Not Jeremiah Owyang.  Not Laura Fitton.  Not David Meerman Scott.

You do.

Photographer: A Schipulite

I generally try not to be a big ol’ buttface when it comes to being tagged for online memes, but actually, I’ve been a big ol’ buttface when it comes to being tagged for online memes.

Between Imelda tagging me back in – gasp! – November with a sixer, and Magsies tagging me at the beginning of the month with an eighter, well, I have squarely missed the window for a timely and polite in-kind reciprocation.  Damn me.

But what’s that saying the young folks use?  The one that validates being late?  Oh yes.  Better late than never! Word.

And so, without further ado, I present:

Six (to Eight?) Random & Awesome Things About Fayza

1. I never buy the first thing off the shelf. Never.  Ever.  I can’t even force myself to do it.  Trust me, I’ve tried.  I’ll immediately circle back around and replace the item on the shelf where I found it.  Then I’ll take the third one, which is now the second one (because, you see, the second one became the first one by virtue of me taking the formerly first one, and now the old second one is the new first one and is thus disqualified for purchase).  And, um, yeah.  I swear I’m not psychotic.

2. I wanted to be an interior designer, but my college career counselor talked me out of it.  I marched into my career counselor’s office early in my freshman year in college (and barely a semester into my Political Science major), and said, “I want to change my major.  To Interior Design.”  She skeptically peered down her glasses at me, ruminated for a bit, and proceeded to sling every reason in the book as to why that was a bad idea.  Perhaps it was; I settled for an International Relations and Spanish major instead.  But I’m not convinced of the truth of her words to this day.  You should see my apartment; I had promise, dude.  Even my mom, who wasn’t a proponent of the switch at the time, has since eaten her words.

3. I’m an All-Ohio actress and an All-Ohio cheerleader.  Err, well, I was in 1996.  The acting honors came from my performance as Emily Webb in Our Town at a one-act invitational competition at Ohio Northern University.  One of the supporting actors?  None other than Jonathan Bennett, perhaps better known as Aaron Samuels in a little movie you may’ve heard of before – Mean Girls.  The cheering accolade was awarded while at a statewide cheerleading camp at Muskingum College called – you guessed it – Cheer Ohio.

4. My most favorite book in the whole wide entire world is The Hundred Dresses. I read it when I was in second grade, and no book has taught me more about being a good person to everyone, no matter what.  Read it yourself; you’ll know why.

5.  I’m deathly claustrophobic. And I don’t mean that figuratively.  I’m not afraid of much, and I have few phobias, but tiny, tightly enclosed spaces?  Yup.  That’s probably the highest on the Holy Shit List.  I once voluntarily allowed someone to put me in a locker in high school (mostly because I could stand up completely straight while inside, and it was awesome), and the person didn’t let me out immediately.  I went out of my mind with hyperventiliation and hysteria – to the point where I couldn’t even vocalize my fears.  As a result, I live in Texas (where everything’s bigger, yeee-haw!) and I do not do those hamster tube slides at waterparks.  If the mafia ever wrongly fingers me and I’m buried alive, rest assured I won’t be once they realize the mistake and exhume me.

6.  I’m allergic to cats. Surprise, surprise, right, since I have one?  I know, but ’tis true.  Itchy, watery eyes, stuffy nose, the whole nine.  I know what an allergic reaction to cats feels like.  It must be my luck of the dander draw, ’cause his doesn’t (and never has) irritate me a bit.

7.  I don’t think I’ll ever get married. I certainly don’t.  Truthfully.  And not in a woe-is-me sort of way.  Not at all.  More like in a geez-I’m-difficult-and-pretty-inconsistent-plus-I-love-love-love-my-independence-a-whole-bunch-and-I-don’t-think-I-want-kids-so-why-bother-really sort of way.  I’m okay with that.  I know you don’t believe me.  But I am.

8.  That’s enough, Fayza, that’s enough. Eight’s too many for me.  I’m already drunk on myself.  I didn’t eat dinner (okay, that’s a lie) and I haven’t consumed enough water.  I’d better quit while I’m ahead.  I don’t wanna wake up with a Fayza hangover in the morning.

And now, you’re it!

• Perky Boobs – If anyone can rattle off six (to eight?) random things that you really wanna read (and can never find the chutzpah to say yourself), lemme tell you, it’s her.
• Maisnon – Always a first-class meme responder, but methinks it is time for some fresh new memesponses!
• Dr. Miggy – I am a robot.  I would like to meet other robots.  Thank you!
• Yasmine – The original rockstar.
• Jun Loayza – Hey, his last name’s 80% of my first name (just gloss over the math), and he’s an Angeleno.  He’s already a winner, in my book.
• David Kadavy - Yet another David that will not take part in this, I’m pretty sure.  But you can’t fault a girl for tryin’.
• George Smith – ‘Cause, ooh, ooh, how exciting is it that friends from my past are movin’ up into the future?