Misophonia - thank God I found a reason!!!

I am often frowned at for my intolerance of certain things, noisy eating, heavy breathing, the dog licking himself, the repeated calls of "Mum, mum, mum, mum," when I'm unable to answer (brushing my teeth mainly). I literally had to move seats on a train once because a girl sitting behind me was chewing gum with her mouth open. I asked my mother to call me back once when she rung me at work whilst eating an apple. I hiss at the dog to shut up when he's licking himself - I don't mean once, I mean like making a meal of his own fur. I listened to a radio show recently and the men that were speaking on it must have been close to the mics and had dry mouths, they clacked out every word, it made my skin crawl.

This is not an exaggeration, the feeling I get when I hear any of the above (apart from the "mum" calling, unless it's first thing in the morning) is that of me wishing I could actually tear off my own skin and gag the offending personage. So you can imagine my relief when I was alerted to the condition known as Misophonia, which is literally "hatred of sound". It's not every sound, but apparently, sufferers normally have a set of "trigger" sounds - mine being things normally to do with people's mouths, chewing, licking, silly noises, heavy breathing. Which funnily enough, I have just realised, could be linked to the fact that I have an almost odd obsession with people's mouths... An internet source states that misophonia is thought to be a neurological disorder which is characterised by negative experiences resulting from specific sounds. Could my issue with people's mouths be the reason behind my hatred of certain sounds? I don't know what it is about mouths, I really don't. But when I used to watch soap operas, I would instantly be irritated by someone with an unusual mouth - extremely pouty lips or overemphasis of the formation of words when speaking. Once something like this became apparent to me on a character, I was unable to let it go and would often complete ignore what was going on in favour of boiling with rage over the ridiculous cake-hole that was being flexed in front of me.

Sex & The City is one of my absolute favourite shows, but the way that Cynthia Nixon would eat in almost every episode seemed to be almost deliberate: She ate with her mouth open. I found it so irritating, that I sometimes looked away when there was a lunch scene with her in it.
No way would it stop me watching it, and I still heart Miranda ... I just couldn't have brunch with her.

"Social" networking??

Social networking sites are the ultimate place to fantasise. I don't mean in a "private" sense, I mean, if you have a number of "friends" that aren't actually friends, you can tell them pretty much anything and they won't question it. These sites are also one of the worst places to visit in you don't have the highest self esteem; constantly looking at pictures of people's luxury holidays, wild nights out, huge engagement rings, new Louboutins etc etc, can leave you with a large dose of the green eyed monster, and it ain't healthy.

People that update every time they have a cup of tea or go to a friend's house or eat a burger are surely lacking in something... Company maybe? Or interest from a significant other? I know it's a way to keep in touch, but do you really think your 284 "friends" care if you've just farted the National Anthem - ok that's something I totally would read because despite being gross, that would be damn impressive.

I am also well aware that these sites are a great place to vent, but I find it beyond irritating to read the following kind of thread:

Jo Bloggs: "Oh my God, I can't believe what's just happened! You think you know someone and now this!"
Concerned friend: "U ok babes?"
Jo Bloggs: "I will be hun, just really upset because of something that someone I THOUGHT I knew has done to me :( "
Nosy Parker: "What's happened hun?"
Jo Bloggs: "I'll message you, I can't talk about it on here."

...

Me: "SO WHY MENTION IT ON HERE IN THE FIRST PLACE??!!"

Attention seeking - that's the only thing I can call it. The need to have people rally round asking if you are okay and what's happened. I don't know if it's lame sad or boo-hoo sad... Do they do it for attention in that they need to feel wanted and that someone gives a damn, or do they do it so that people will worry about them or do they do it to show what dramatic lives they lead? Whichever reason it is, just stop bloody doing it! Or at least put something like "I just caught my boyfriend in bed with the next door neighbour, I kicked her ass and threw his clothes out of the window, I have no idea where he is and I don't care. I am now going to consume a bottle of red wine and listen to Celine Dion - Tina, could you please come to my house in approximately 48 hours to make sure I haven't flushed my own head down the toilet." That would leave no questions unanswered, everyone would know what's going on, you would probably feel better and you wouldn't be pissing anyone off - except your neighbour and your now ex-boyfriend, and maybe Tina if she's having to cancel her mani-pedi to come and dry your toilet hair.

I use these sites that I am somewhat damning, I have deactivated my account on more than one occasion, the longest spell was for a month, and by then, I had almost kicked the habit but I reactivated out of curiosity, and I was back in the loop. I claim that I keep my account open because of all the pictures I have on there, and so I can keep updated on things such as pregnancies of friends - but if they are real friends, shouldn't I be keeping up with them in other ways? In truth, I am nosy and afraid of missing something, even it is someone going to McDonalds for their lunch. I want to delete my accounts, I really do, but then I'm out of the loop, people know things before I do and I don't like it. And sometimes I want to share a picture, or the fact that I fancy Kevin Spacey or a witty anecdote to brighten my friends' days for a moment. But I don't like Facebook, it continually fucks up with privacy issues. I do, however, like Twitter. I despise Trolls on any site.

So that's my rant over, and in way more than 140 characters. But we are so often interacting via text, email, networking sites that I suppose the question is, in a world where technology is taking over, are we forgetting how to communicate?