Google Plus must be lame because here I am

If you know me at all, you know I'm not a "tech guy;" I've never exactly blazed any kind of a trail in the digital revolution. And I know that may seem kind of strange considering my first two novels have been published exclusively electronically.

The fact of the matter is I don't enjoy electronic gadgets, mostly because I don't care about taking the time to learn how to use them. This explains why the years when VCR's were changing over to DVD players was such a stressful time for me.

Sure, I have a cell phone - I have three kids, how could I not? - but while the rest of family owns Droid smart phones, and I'm constantly suffering serious pressure to join the club, I'm happy with my LG something-or-other that doesn't get the Internet. Although I can check my email on it, so maybe it does, I'm not quite sure.

See what I mean? I don't care much about that stuff.

But here's the thing: When I decided to start writing books, I knew I needed a way to market my work, as well as to network with readers and other writers.

The solution? I opened a Myspace account (or, to be more accurate, my wife opened it for me)! But just about the time I cowboyed up, everyone else was jumping the Myspace ship for that shiny new Facebook thing. I didn't want to leave Myspace, because, after all, I had taken all that time to learn how to use it and Facebook seemed so . . . foreign.

Eventually, though, I could no longer ignore the mass migration. I would make a post on Myspace and could practically hear it rattling around in cyberspace.

So, when I could no longer convince myself Myspace was where it was at, I opened up a Facebook account (or, to be more accurate, my wife started it for me)! But, you guessed it, just about the time I figured this Facebook thing out, everyone else had discovered that shiny new Twitter thing.

Well I haven't quite worked up the courage to start a Twitter account yet, although I'll probably do that fairly soon (are you listening, honey?). I still find it very hard to believe anyone besides my immediate family would want to hear my 140-character thoughts on anything, and I know even they're ignoring me most of the time.

And now there's another problem: there's a newer shiny thing taking off, called Google Plus, or maybe just Google +, I'm not too sure. This is supposed to be like Facebook, only better, and of course Facebook was supposed to be like Myspace, only better.

What's a Luddite to do? I'm just about ready to dip a toe into the Twitter ocean and here comes something else! Pretty soon the world will be all social media, all the time. Or maybe we're already there. As you may have noticed, I tend to lag a bit.

Anyway, I'd like to apologize to the folks at Google who, I'm sure, have worked very hard on their Google Plus (or Google +) project. I just joined, thanks to the possibly misguided invitation of Chris White at StoneHouse/StoneGate Ink.

This, of course, means you are no longer cool, Google Plus, because by the time I find you, all the cool kids are on to something else. Sorry about that.