Bowery Mural

GTwestival - the aftermath

Thursday 1 April 2010

As a follow on from my previous post about relationships via social media outlets i thought i'd do a follow up so i could quantify or indeed, poo poo my own thoughts.  But before i give a final opinion i'll tell you what happened...

Last Thursday saw me on a jaunt to Glasgow to attend the Glasgow Twestival.  (Twitter festival - get it?)  A night to raise funds for the charity Concern.  Twestivals were taking place in cities all over the world via the power of Twitter.  This would be the night that i'd meet three more people and add them to the two already on my 'putting faces to names' list on Twitter!  

After freezing in a bus stop on the Great Western Road they arrived.  @LilacSwizzle (Nicola), @Pyllon (Paul) and the ever so shy and retiring @markofrespect (Mark).  :o)






We made our way into the Landsdowne Bar & Kitchen, got our Twitter name badges, had a picture (or two taken) and got a drink (2 cocktails & 2 mocktails!).  I don't know about those three but i'll admit to being a little bit nervous meeting three new people for the first time but somehow after about 10 minutes I felt fine.  They were everything I'd imagined and better.  I couldn't help thinking that there are in fact people on Twitter that I might not want to meet but these were people I did and they were ace and made me feel very welcome indeed. 

A guy came over and turns out he was an illusionist - or spooky guy - one of the two.  He asked if anyone knew someone called Phil.  I said I did but not well (I'm talking about you @Bobinson).  Anyway he done this 'trick' where i had to think of a card i would imaging i was telling Phil and then tell everyone.  (Now a point worth noting is this - I did think about the ace of hearts and then changed it to the 5 of clubs...).   He took a pack of cards from his jacket pocket and started putting them down on the table one by one until he came to one that had Phil written on it.  He turned it over and yes... it was the 5 of clubs!  It was so weird and freaky.  Especially since i'd changed it from ace of hearts to this.  I sat and wondered if he'd somehow read my mind, my body language or was this a whole load of poppycock.  He then did a few other 'tricks' and they all worked out right!  Was this coincidence or was he really an illusionist - a good one at that!


@LilacSwizzle had brought me a present (@Pyllon and @markofrespect said it was from all of them but i know the truth!! ).  The present was an adorable shiny bike bell as seen below.  I was delighted.  It was time to exchange gifts... so i gave them my cross-stitched Twitter name badges and they loved them.  (I hope?).  @markofrespect was particularly pleased with his, tweeting a photo almost immediately.  I was delighted I could bring a smile to faces with my handy work!         






Next up were the raffle tickets.  I bought £5 worth, i'm pretty lucky - sometimes.  The others bought some too.  By this time there were more #tweegies in the venue and it was pretty good, music playing and chatting.  The first band came on (sorry I can't remember their name), they were ok! but quite loud so talking was just shouting really.  I was aware I was perhaps a bit quiet but hoped the didn't notice -  i really do get tongue-tied, i mean in my head I'm saying things but they never seem to come out of my mouth.  Probably the reason i like blogging and tweeting really.  I get a few seconds grace to think first.  Anyway it was time for the raffle draw and auction!!  Mark won two prizes and i got myself one - oh yeah! - a 3 course meal for 2 in the Landsdowne Bar with Champagne!!  not too shabby at all, i was well pleased with my lot (except that champagne will be wasted on me).  Anyway the night went on and a while later we departed.  I drove home in freezing fog feeling pretty satisfied that i went along and pleased that i had met these three lovely people who i hope i can now call friends.     

So that's it.  Four individuals who'd been brought together by the power of Twitter.  And here is my summation of the whole social media relationship... phenomena?
I can hand on my heart say that these are people I would never have had the opportunity to meet if it hadn't been for Twitter.  In fact i'd have considered myself not cool enough to be part of their group.  We are all individuals and yet we connected in some way via Twitter.  And to me that is a wonderful thing - right?  Moving in new circles, meeting new and interesting people can benefit us all.  I could say more and gush on about them but i know @markofrespect will be embarrassed!!  :o)  






As someone mentioned in a comment on the previous post, there are people i follow on Twitter but i wouldn't necessarily want to meet them, there are others i'd want to meet but probably never will and there are may be those who i meet and think - idiot!  But it's the fact that those options are here for all to savour that's the greatest idea to me.  I say don't knock it until you've tried it but don't tell me that there's nothing to gain by blogging, tweeting, emailing... or even facebooking.  I love my wee blog and the last post has seen more comments than most of my other posts and for that I'm grateful.  It has also allowed me to meet people - well only one in person but you know what i mean.  it has allowed me to build relationships with people from all over the world USA, Australia and right here in Scotland.     


My final lessons and thoughts are: there are people you follow on Twitter or who may follow you, go meet them!  You should.  If you don't connect in person, fine but you'll never know unless you try.  Also I'm now going to try to get over my extreme shyness, it's not doing me any good.  But the good news is that since last Thursdays night out I have struck up conversations with people in the gym, with people at work, with total strangers and it felt good.  High five!!  I've also gained some new followers (#tweegies) thank you and i'd like to meet some of you too.

Thanks so much to @markofrespect for suggesting I attend the GTwestival and for being like an adult version of my hyperactive nephew! (that's a good thing by the way!)   Big thank you to @LilacSwizzle for being a totally cool lady and for my fabulous bike bell (it's getting fitted this weekend!)  and huge thanks to @pyllon for being a really cool guy and for awarding me the tile of honourary #tweegie! (btw i hope you don't mind the photo's being on here!)  Big hugs to you all.  

Ange xx      

2 comments:

  1. Wow that looked like a fab night. In response to your last post comment, I noticed ||||||| had left, but I always think it's a little weird when people tell you nothing about themselves. I didn't know if they were male, female or what haha.

    Yeah if I am down we should def meet up, likewise if your in Aberdeen :)

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  2. Sounds 'interesting'. I must meet some of my tweeps this summer :) The USA lot have regular climbing tweetups but it's just too far :(

    I agree with you about twitter/fb/etc. giving you a little bit of grace to put together a decent response as vs. RL.

    No need to precede statements with "umm" "yeah, erm" etc.!

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