It started June 25, 2008: “Testing, testing. Is this thing on?” My first tweet. I began by trying to make a few friends laugh. I had no idea how quickly tweeting would consume me. Before long I was posting 20 to 30 times a day, seven days a week. Some of my posts were funny, some sad, some vaguely existential — “Living happily ever after is killing me” — some flirty, some filthy. I posted daily for three years with only one exception — the day my father-in-law died. Eventually, I attracted about 25,000 followers. Not bad for a noncelebrity.