Initially Confused

The mummy blogging community is a very friendly and inclusive one, but like all communities, it can be a bit daunting when you first join. And like many communities, it has its own language, which you have to learn. Being something of a new bee myself, I confess that I found all those sets of initials that people use a bit off-putting, until I worked out what they all stand for. I thought it might be helpful for other new bees if I gave you a list. So this is for all you uninitiated bloggers out there, or un-initial-ated, I should say!

LOL – at first I thought this meant ‘lots of love’, because the mummy blogging community is so supportive and caring, but now I know it means ‘laugh out loud’. So you use this when you think something is funny. It tells people that you are laughing, but it’s shorter than writing “I think this is really funny”.

PMSL – this is similar to LOL. It means ‘post myself laughing’, as in posting a blog post – except you’re posting yourself!

ROFL –this is one of those that really reflects just how caring and sharing the blogging community is. It stands for ‘reach out for love’. You use it if you want to say ((((hugs)))) to someone, but without the hugs.

Sometimes you see ROTFL, which is basically the same: ‘reach out there for love’. Or ROTFLMAO, which just emphasizes the point: ‘reach out there for love, me and others’. What a fantastic community we are!

IMHO – stands for ‘I’m hoping’. Here’s an example of how you could use it in context: “The government cuts won’t be as bad as all the doom merchants are predicting, IMHO”.

There. Hope that helps, or HTH, as we might say!

There is one set of initials that I’ve never managed to work out. Maybe someone out there can enlighten me. It’s WTF. I mean, what the heck could that possibly stand for?

Iota from The Iota Quota was being Dee in this post. If you would like a chance to write as Dee or Des then simply email us at deeparrot@gmail.com