Social Media Super Psycho Fail

I cannot remember laughing so hard.

Except that it really wasn't funny at all.

I was in Lana's car; we had just completed a spot of shopping. And as she was dropping me back home, she pulled out her phone and showed me an Instagram photo that was concerning her.

"Look at this," she said. "Tell me what you think."

It was a picture posted by a child we both know. And it was really inappropriate. Doesn't matter why, it just was. Very adult. Not the kind of picture a child should be posting. I was horrified.

"God, that's worrying," I said.

"I know," Lana agreed.

"Should we tell the mother?"

"We should tell someone," Lana said.

I thought for a moment. Maybe we were making too much of it? "Let me look properly," I told Lana, and she held out the phone.

Oh my god. What was that the kid was wearing? I absentmindedly tapped on the image to enlarge it.

Oh. My. God.

"I liked the picture!" I cried.

"Oh no!" Lana yelled.

Artist's Impression of Lana at this point

"Oh god oh god I'm sorry!" I looked at the phone in my hand in horror and threw it back to Lana like it was on fire. "Oh god! I didn't mean to!"

Lana was aghast. "Oh no!" she cried. "Oh no oh no oh no!!!!! I can't like the picture! People will think I'm a paedophile! Oh no! Unlike! UNLIKE!"

She tapped the picture again. The little 'Like' heart reappeared cheerily on the screen.

"OH NO!!!" Lana was practically hyperventilating. "I'VE LIKED IT TWICE!!! OH MY GOD!!! I'M A DOUBLE PAEDOPHILE! MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP!!"

I tried to make it stop. I really did. But I started to laugh. Like, really laugh. Seriously, uncontrollably laugh. With my head thrown back and tears in my eyes and my feet stomping on the floor of the car because it was so damn funny. Visions of horrified mothers talking about Sicko Lana floated through my mind. I clutched my sides and gasped for breath.

Next to me, poor Lana was waving the phone around frantically. "I've liked the disturbing picture!!!" And then she started laughing too. "NOOOOO! NOOOOOO!!!!"

We both sat there, in the car, quite literally falling over laughing. It was the best feeling in the world. Of course, it wouldn't be the best feeling when Lana was banned from having children over for play dates and her son was ostracised from his friends, but for now it was pretty damn funny.

 And then, suddenly, Lana worked it out. "I unliked it! I just hit the Like button again and I unliked it! Oh thank god. THANK GOD!!!!"

And then we both laughed for another ten minutes. And now I'm laughing again just thinking about it. Lana is probably still traumatised. But that makes it all the more funny.

Ever had a social media FAIL???

WTF Is Going On With My Hands?

The other day, rummaging in Places I Probably Shouldn't Rummage, I came across this photo.

I am 16 and wearing pearls.

This picture was taken in 1985, on my school Muck-Up night. I was 16 years old and dreadfully excited. I was also, I now appreciate, dreadfully dressed. Whereas some other 16 might go for a 'Good Girl Goes Bad' look to celebrate their high school graduation, I was geared more towards the 'Medical Receptionist meets Flower Child'. Perhaps it was deeply fashionable in some very niche circles, but I suspect the niche was made up solely of me.

I was terribly fond of my salmon pink shirt and its matching, calf-length white skirt. Sadly, the photograph does not do justice to the brocade-like print, or the high polyester count of the fabric. Happily, though, you can appreciate the string of pearls, so effortlessly (read: carefully) slung around my neck.

As for the smudge on my cheek, no, it was not a hideous birthmark that I have since had removed in a painful but ultimately rewarding surgical procedure. It was a flower, that I had begged my mother to paint on my face. Despite my profoundly conservative attire (and the fact that it was the 80's, and I was a decade too late), I fancied myself as a bit of a hippie. My lovely mother acquiesced, so it is she who is responsible for my completely idiotic appearance.

But all of that pales into significance next to my hands. Because... what the fuck is going on with my hands?

This is not the kind of gesture nice medical receptionists make

I got such a shock looking at this picture. I am making an obscene gesture with my hands! Presumably I wasn't aware of it, but still! I can't believe it! It is like listening to a Taylor Swift album backwards and hearing Satanic messages, or finding your sweet five year child old planning monstrous acts of evil (except that I do find my five year old planning monstrous acts of evil, but you get the idea).

So honestly, people, I have no idea who I am in this picture. A flower child? A medical receptionist? A naughty, naughty girl? Or just a confused 16 year old who paired a salmon shirt with a rude gesture and still passed it off as sweet?

Whoever I am, though, I am glad those days are over. For one thing, I don't wear polyester anymore.

And for another thing, if I'm going to make a rude gesture, I'm going to make damn sure I know I'm doing it.

There Is No Excuse

I don't get outraged a lot these days. The older I get, the more aware I am of my own flaws and limitations, and the less I judge other people. What's more, as the years go by, the more attuned I am to the dark side of the human condition, and the less surprised I am by some of the shocking things that occur.

But the Chrissie Swan saga outrages me. Not because the woman had a sneaky cigarette whilst pregnant. I mean, seriously people - do we not have more important things to worry about? She didn't beat one of her already-born children, or take to her pregnant stomach with an iron bar. She didn't mainline heroin or strap a dozen mobile phones to her stomach to send radiation to her poor helpless fetus. She didn't even smoke a pack a day. She had a few sneaky cigarettes. I mean, give me a break.

And yet the woman is required to offer a tearful apology to the entire nation because of her bad behaviour. It is outrageous. It is none of our business. NONE. It has nothing to do with you and nothing to do with me. Chrissie Swan is a 'personality'. She has made her living through media work - television, radio and newsprint. And good on her. That is incredibly hard to do and she has risen above the pack and succeeded. I admire her and I envy her.

But the fact that she has made her living through media work does not make her public property. Chrissie Swan is not Kyle Sandilands. I have listened to her radio show many times and read her columns and watched her on TV. She is respectful of other people, self-deprecating and warm. She does not deserve or invite public shredding.

As for Woman's Day, well, they ought to be ashamed of themselves. They won't be, of course, because they are a tabloid publication, and celebrate women by mocking their weight gain, pointing out their plastic surgery, speculating on their eating disorders, and celebrating their personal tragedies. Of course they're going to publish photos of yet another 'fallen' celebrity, however ridiculously fabricated the 'fall'.

I just wish they weren't pretending to believe they were doing a community service by highlighting the dangers of smoking whilst pregnant, because that is cruelly and laughably disingenuous. We all know the dangers of smoking whilst pregnant. They did it because they knew it would sell a lot of magazines, at the expense of a decent human being. And there is no excuse.

Sometimes, these days, I still get outraged.

Worst. Pic. Ever. Now with ACTUAL PHOTO.

YUP.

So today I took the worst photograph of myself in five years. Yes, it was time for my license renewal, that most hideous of chores for anyone who doesn't like seeing themselves portrayed on a small oblong card as a demented, ice-addicted criminal.

My old license expired yesterday, and I was happy to see it go. Even though it was taken five years ago, when I was still in my thirties, the picture makes me look like a fifty four year old - a fifty four year old with a bad case of scurvy who hasn't slept in about a year.

I knew that license photos are never attractive, but I felt that with a bit of preparation and a lot of makeup, I could beat the odds and produce one that, at the very least, wouldn't make my daughter cry when she stumbled upon it in my purse.

So this morning I carefully applied some eyeshadow and lipstick, and used about three litres of concealer on the bags under my eyes. I washed my hair and put in lots of 'product' to make it bouncy and curly, and made sure that it was draped artfully over my sticky-out ear (and the other ear too, just to be symmetrical).

And off I went to the RTA.



I filled out my forms and paid the bill, and then the lovely young man behind the counter told me not to smile.

Well, let me tell you this. I don't respond well to being told not to smile.

I began to giggle. Then I began to laugh. Then I tried to smother my laughter by biting my tongue. Then I took a deep breath and pursed my lips to calm myself down....

And that's when the photo was taken.

It is terrible. Just awful. I look like a middle aged virgin schoolteacher who lost her fiance in the war, and has never recovered from the pain. Even worse, my hair is flat on the top and the bags under my eyes are dark grey.

So the moral of the story is, don't even bother trying. License photos are there to hurt you and amuse everyone else.

And if you can't hack that bitter truth, go buy yourself a pushbike and leave the car at home. Which is what I am thinking of doing in another five years time.