This week on TwitterStars.com, I’m featuring a series of guest posts featuring stories from several of my Twitter followers on how they quit smoking. I quit smoking last week and thought featuring stories from other people about how they quit cigarettes would be a fun project for the blog.

Guest Blog Post by @Danacea

You know how it goes. It’s Friday night, you’re at the birthday bash of someone in your office. You’re three pints down and feeling no pain; your confidence is absolute.

Then there’s his breathy, husky voice in your ear, ‘Go on, you know you want to.’ And you do; after all, one won’t hurt.

His touch is utterly familiar—it’s been a while but it’s just like your oldest pair of jeans, comfortable. And besides, you’re only flirting…

The following evening, you stay in—one became two and you’re a little wary about running into him. It gets to about half-eight, though, and his chill, yellow-tipped fingers are teasing your skin; you can hear him saying your name. You want his company. It’s just for tonight, you tell yourself; no-one need know.

In the morning, there’s no sign of him—you’re relieved (after all, you got old enough to deal with this stuff some years ago). But wait: he’s left you his phone number—look, there, it’s on that packet by the sofa where you first embraced him.

You slam it in a drawer; you promise yourself you’re not going to think about him. Evening comes, you have a bath and pack your stuff and pick out your clothes for the morning… every time you open that drawer, though, you find you miss his touch.

Cursing yourself, you pick up the packet. After all, if you finish it then you can put it in the bin and be rid of it. He joins you again on the sofa; smiling through yellowed teeth. You tell him this is it, that after tonight you’re not going to call him again and he needs to leave you alone.

He says nothing. He doesn’t need to.

In the morning, he’s still there.

Those hands that were cool and compelling are now stained and soured and stinking. You run for your morning train and they’re wrapped around your ribcage—as strong as steel. Suddenly, you can’t breathe. Coughing doubles you over; you drop your bag…

…somehow, there’s a second packet among its scattered contents—you swear you didn’t buy it, he must’ve put it there.

You cough denial until your eyes water.

But your own breath tells you—it’s already too late.

Danie Ware is behind the PR, marketing, and event organizing for Forbidden Planet (London).

If you’ve enjoyed Danie’s guest post on digital culture, please consider reading her fiction at:

danieware.googlepages.com

I’m a professional on and off-line Marketeer for Forbidden Planet London as well as being a Mum, a keen cyclist and weight-trainer, an old school geek, a bit of a longhair, and a social media convert. This is my professional and personal thoughts, stream-of-consciousness style.

A copy of this guest post has also been posted to The Nicotine Asylum.

Guest Blog Post by @Danacea

Recently I used the word twactic as a throwaway quip in a tweet. Inexplicably, this landed me blog love and a place in the Twitter twiki twictionary… and left me amazed at how something so simple had made such an impact.

Haven’t we done this to death? I mean…

Twusts - The things you can tell in confidence to twitter friends - precisely because you’ve never met them

Twabbit - Potential contact tracked down through Summize (as in: be vewy, vewy qwiet…)

TWAT - Acronym for Twitter Weapons and Tactics - the art of using your account to promote your brand. (Why, what were you thinking I meant?)

Twagic - Losing 15 followers and instantly becoming paranoid

Twigger - The tweet that touches a nerve and explodes you into a seething mass of fury

Twaturation - The chatty types are awake

Twechie - The guy who has 10,000 followers, yet tweets only techspeak and that rarely

Twalker - The creepy guy who follows 40 people, all of them women - yet never speaks.

Twouch! - The moment of horror when you see your last DM in the public timeline

Twelief - Understanding the DM wasn’t one of yours

Twincing - Realizing the person you had IM sex with last night is going to make pointed public remarks for the next three days

Twit - Feeling like one

This list can go on and on… feel free to add your own.

Twitter is—what?—eighteen months old? It’s growing by the day, its tantrums are getting worse—I guess this means it isn’t a baby any more—and that means its language skills are developing rapidly. Twitter-branding words by putting a ‘t’ and a ‘w’ in front of them is getting as annoying as txtspk… We’re a smart bunch; if we, in our microcosm, are going to develop our own linguistic structure, then I think it’s time we took a step up the evolutionary ladder.

Before we end up with an in-joke that no-one else understands.

Twalliteration is a one-twick pony. Let’s expand our horizons.

Maybe something in a vowel…

Danie Ware is behind the PR, marketing, and event organizing for Forbidden Planet (London).

If you’ve enjoyed Danie’s guest post on digital culture, please consider reading her fiction at:

danieware.googlepages.com

Or Danie’s blog at:

I’m a professional on- and off-line Marketeer for Forbidden Planet London as well as being a Mum, a keen cyclist and weight-trainer, an old school geek, a bit of a longhair and a social media convert. This is my professional and personal thoughts, stream-of-consciousness style.