#selfies

In terms of awkwardness, most selfies score pretty high. Not to mention getting caught taking one. But the worst thing has to be the downright selfie-abuse due to a never ending daily selfie-overload on the Internet. Now, don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with a good old selfie every now and again. But the thing is, there are limits. Just don't overdo it. In this case, less is always more. Terms which unfortunately don't exist in every girl's or guy's dictionary. 

By the way, ever wondered who took the first selfie? 
Wikipedia never disappoints:

Russian Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna at the age of 13 was one of the first teenagers to take her own picture using a mirror to send to a friend in 1914. In the letter that accompanied the photograph, she wrote, "I took this picture of myself looking at the mirror. It was very hard as my hands were trembling."

Now this is something we can work with. Descriptive caption, lack of pouting and not even a single #selfie #swag or #yolo involved.

Whereas nowadays, it’s quite the task to take a proper selfie. Apart from the heavy burden of choosing relevant (…) hashtags, one silly snappy picture won’t deliver if you want to go hardcore. Real hardcore.

Arm up, high angle, chin out, slightly tilted face, smile, smize, sneeze - what? no sneeze, casual stroke through hair, little wink (?), mouth open, tongue out - please don't - and click. And click. And click. Who has ever achieved a perfect selfie in one go right? Hair up, eyes squeezed. Now work it girl. Click. Click. Click. 'Fudge, my nose looks big.’ Different angle, eyebrows raised, mouth closed – thank god - PLEASE NO DUCKFACE. PLEASE NO DUCKFACE. Click. Too late. Click. Click. Peace sign, pinky promise, thumbs up, middle finger, rock star, bite your pink, one-eyed pirate, fake finger moustache. Jesus woman, how many tricks have you got on hand? Click. Click. Besides, I hope that’s all your hands do on pictures. Click. “Why is my skin so shiny? Why does my hair looks weird? Who’s that dude in the corner? What happened to my shoulder? And why do I look so fat?!! Never mind, after I've finished deleting all my other 368 attempts, I'll just crop, mirror, zoom and insta-filter that away.”

Now, I do acknowledge the joy of filters, effects, texts and other extra's; but again, please know your limits. Over-filtering a picture has never brought anyone any good. So when in doubt, just keep this in mind: there are people who know what you look like in 'real life'.

Meanwhile, in my foolish attempt to reduce the online selfie-uploading-frequency, the time has come to bring up some hard data. After some strenuous research, this is what I've found.

Please allow me to quote the Oxford Dictionaries:

Definition of selfie in English:
New words: August 2013
Pronunciation: /ˈsɛlfi/

(also selfy)
noun (plural selfies)

informal _ a photograph that one has taken of oneself,
typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website: occasional selfies are acceptable, but posting a new picture of yourself every day isn’t necessary.

I repeat: occasional selfies are acceptable, but posting a new picture of yourself every day isn't necessary. For which just in case:

Definition of necessary in English:
1. needed to be done, achieved, or present; essential: they granted the necessary planning permission it's not necessary for you to be here.

Got it?
Great.

Oh and FYI, best selfie ever?

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Aki Hoshide, Expedition 32 flight engineer, uses a digital still camera to expose a photo of his helmet visor during the mission's third session of extravehicular activity (EVA). source

No filter needed indeed.