So let’s talk about Foursquare. What do you know about Foursquare. I, personally, know quite a lot about it. I mean, a lot a lot. Too much a lot.

I am addicted. Twitter-like addicted. I have a Twitter-like addiction to Foursquare. Those, there, are some heavy, profound words. And you either get it or you don’t. If you do, come over and give me a hug. We’ll get through this together.

For the rest of you, let me tell you about Foursquare.

Foursquare is simply a way to let your friends and family know what you are doing at all  times.  Why do they care what you are doing? They don’t. But it’s 2013 and everything has become one giant, huge overshare.

AKA. A Day in My Life

Wednesday Morning, 6:30am.
Have overslept by an hour. Rushing out the door, I throw dry food in the dish of my disapproving cat who glares at me with barely concealed disdain. I grab a slice of cold pizza out of the fridge, smile and wave at her, feeling like a giant idiot doing so.

Did I just wave to my cat.

I jump into my car and immediately (obediently) glance down at my phone. Time to fire up Foursquare! The app is GPS-based so businesses near my house instantly come up. My selections…a Quick trip, a bus stop, a Lifetime Fitness. I select Lifetime Fitness and am instantly rewarded with a “fitness badge”.

This is your fifteenth check-in at this location! Keep up the great work!

I feel smug. I feel accomplished. I feel fat.
I’ve just polished off a greasy slice of pizza while claiming to work out in a fitness center that I have never in my life set foot into, ever. This is likely unethical or something. And, yes, I do feel strangely guilty. And kinda naughty. But most of all, I feel full. That pizza was huge and greasy and not a good idea whatsoever, no.

Bad news.

I drive down the street, with my belly full of greasy pizza, and hit a light. Foursquare hits again.

I don’t need to read my choices, I know exactly my next check-in….

Redemption Catholic Church.

To recap. So far this morning, according to Foursquare, I have gone to a Britney’s Advanced Spinning Class and headed to a very Holy Mass.

That’s some Foursquare cred, right there, and I’m feeling ALRIGHT.

And this, my dears, is how foursquare works.  I lie my way through the day.

I take a spirited jog on my lunch hour around Tempe Town Lake.

I attend a smashing play in the evening.

I go to a wine bar for a nightcap.

It’s really quite lovely, this imaginary life.

But a problematic one. There is a hitch. My life isn’t always imaginary. The reality is I do have a surprisingly, even  fulfilling, real life. With real life people in it. Many, if not most, of my check-in’s are actually, well, REAL.

I am but a boy (girl) that cried wolf (foursquare).

And thus the point of this blog. Let me just come clean. If you and I are foursquare buddy pals or if you and I will be future foursquare buddy pals, just know that I have never in my entire long life gone into a Redemption Catholic Church. That’s just a filthy lie.  Same as the Tempe City Jail. I’ve never been arrested. Oh, and I also don’t take the “Party Bus” home every night. What even is that.  And, I hope it goes without saying, I am not the mayor of Cannabis City.

My real life? I may have a quiet dinner with a good friend, head home, send off some tweets, resist my Facebook and work double time at getting back on my cats good graces.

But tomorrow is a new day.
Of plotting, planning, scheming my next Foursquare check-in.

See you there.

Photo’s: Foursquare by Sean MacEntee, Church by Vik Nanda, Pizza by Foodphoria