Implementation Defined avatar

Messaging Effort Part 1: Symptoms

It’s frustrating messaing me. It’s frustrating reading messages from me. I’m frustrated when im writing messages. I’d really like to fix this.

Sit down, and let me bring you in on the feeling. A message thread might look like this:

Andy: Have you seen what valve just posted?

Dan: I cant belive i thought i was giong to be able to afford it.

Dan: * beliebe

Dan: * believe * going

Okay It’s not that bad. There was a lot of melodrama for a fairly standard occurance, but this is endemic in my chat history. If you were to scroll back through my messages you’d feel your blood pressure rising.

Now it could look a little different. A friend could be lucky and open the message late enough that I’ve carefully edited the original to remove the errors. No harm, no fowl foul. But there is a guarantee that at least one member of the chat found the process less than ideal.

I considered why i do this. Why my thumb, finger, or supplementary digit makes a sprint for the send key as soon as the last letter is type, I jotted down a few theories in a notepad.

  1. I type how I talk. I’m just so frenetic, fast paced, my brain goes too fast for my own good and the mental health of those around me.

  2. I want to project the image that item 1 is true.

  3. I’m lazy.

  4. A heady mix of the above, though noticeably lacking in the flavour of 1.

Sadly upon reflection of the contents of the “Why do I do this to myself” note, I think 4 is probably correct. At least in the majority. There is some long standing muscle memory in there too, giving everything the occasional swift kick in the side, but its no great mystery. Though, at the bottom of the note, there are some doodles and lovecraftian scribblings that may prove mildly interesting. I think we will be exploring them in a part 2.