By the Time This Sour Cream Expires, You and I Will Be Married

Sometimes shopping for toppings for your baked potato is enough to leave you grinning ear-to-ear.  Of course it's just a ceremony, and it doesn't mean anything that's not already there.  But at the same time, it means everything.

Book in Hand: Joshilyn Jackson's excellent Backseat Saints (Jesus, why does the softcover jacket suck so hard?)

My baby took this picture of me, and I love it.  Last night, I made it my new profile picture on Twitter.  I also made her picture of Shakespeare and Company in Paris the background, the same one which adorns Sweet.  I got five new followers last night, too.  Coincidence?  Hell, no.

It might have had something to do with my proficiency with the hashtag #bookswithalettermissing, though.  If you don't know, you add that "#" to a phrase on Twitter and everything with that phrase comes up.  It's like bookmarking a conversation:  

@TweetwFallnFishAaron John Curtis

Bridget Joe's Diary. Kind of like Middlesex, but, you know, British. #bookswithalettermissing

@DanielPinkDaniel Pink 

Nancy Dre -- Plucky girl detective marries iconic rap star. Complications ensue.#bookswithalettermissing

dtdelosh Diana Delosh 

Here's Waldo #bookswithalettermissing

8 hours ago

That was a weird phenomenon.  I meant to change my picture and go to sleep, but instead I got caught up in this addictive word game.  I was telling myself how funny I was, while laughing at other people's choices.

Soon, it became a trend, which is what Twitter calls popular stuff.  Once that happened, all hell broke loose.

Twitter is where... well, you're on the web, you probably don't need me to tell you its reputation.  #bookswithalettermissing was far too literary from some ("Why the hell is #bookswithalettermissing trending?!?!") and some who tried to participate just didn't get it ("Harr Potter," "Girl Who Played with Wire").

It stopped trending almost as soon as it started as bibliophiles the world over who'd swelled the hashtag recoiled in horror from the banality ("The Da Vinci Cod, hahaha"), the ignorant ("how do i know i don read jk"), and the painful ("He Hunger Games").

Twitter is proof; when something gets too popular, it goes to shit.