I recently made what I feel is a momentous decision. I've decided to stop capitalizing when texting, even when a text has more than one sentence. Oh yeah, I won't capitalize anymore, even after a period. Why? Sheer laziness. It's hard touching that extra button to capitalize and I have to think about when to capitalize. No, I'm done with that.
I tried it yesterday for the first time and it felt sooooo good. However, I couldn't escape the dirty feeling it gave me, like a guilty pleasure. Maybe it's because I'm a writer, and knowingly flouting grammatical correctness is like smoking when you're pregnant. You know you shouldn't, but damn, that cigarette goes down smooth.
I've also started abbreviating my language. "Whatever" has turned into "whatevs"; "laughing out loud" has become "lolled"; be right back is now "brb"; "oh my God", you guessed it, "omg". And these are old ones that are already dated. There are a plethora of new abbreviations popping up at breakneck speed. I can't even keep up.
I think there's general agreement that this modern phenomena of language hacking is due to the way we now communicate, instantaneously via electronic devices.
The idea of calling someone, like, on a phone, now seems foreign. Why would I want to speak to someone when I can text them? Sure, texting usually takes longer than dialing a phone number. Wait, what am I talking about? No one "dials" anymore. We press one button in our contacts list and wham! we're calling someone.
But then you've got the whole having to talk to a real person thing, and frankly, typing a text is less complicated. And let's face it, some people aren't phone people. They're the nicest peeps around when you're with them, but on the phone, they sound rude and preoccupied. You know the ones. I bet texting has saved their social lives.
I never thought I would be a texter, and I certainly never thought I would give up capitalizing to make texting easier. Then again, I didn't think I would ever use the Internet. Go figure. Now I'm an iPhone whore, downloading Miley Cyrus from iTunes, playing Angry Birds and texting without capitals. I've become a modern cliché.
Any more mainstream and I'll be hawking wares for Abercrombie and Fitch, uploading video diaries on YouTube and tweeting about my latest bowel movement.
2 comments:
Hey kd lang, that decision makes sense. Texting isnt real writing, as I am coming to accept.
That being said I am mostly still using full words, some of the abbreviations are just too silly for me, even though that is what "the kids" are doing these days....!
What disturbs me the most is how lazy I'm getting and how these abbreviations are crossing over into my spoken words. I fear in a few years I'll be speaking "text" instead of English.
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