Mobiles might boost your love life but can also help you catch that love rat!

~Vanguard, Nigeria. 

Sending erotic messages from one cell phone to another has become liberating to the average enthusiast today. It is no longer news that a lot of mobile users now dabble in typed foreplay and sizzling erotic messages that make the mind boggle! The devil, they say, makes work for idle hands (thumbs?), so why not keep them busy by texting?

When the texting bug first bit, everybody thought it was a teenage craze but it looks like anybody that can master the technique of their mobile instantly becomes hooked! Only these days, there are some texting etiquette to follow, to make sure you get it right to a T! With testing going through the roof especially during festive periods, readers need a few tips.

"Before texting became popular, you had to make solid arrangement to see someone before you left the house," commented a top mobile sales executive. "Now we're a lot more flexible and spontaneous – you can be walking down the road, fancy a drink at your favourite spot, and text your mates to join you. We can also keep in touch with a lot moire people, even if we don't speak to them that much, they become text friends." But texting has also changed our lives – and not always for the better. A lot of affairs are constantly being discovered when a suspicious partner decides to investigate his or her other half's phone. These discoveries have given rise to the number of love-rats, making partners more suspicious than ever before.

"But think of the boost and freedom the mobile has given to our love lives!" enthused Muni, a 35-year-old businesswoman. 'Thanks to the mobile, spicing up your sex life doesn't have to involve elaborate new mattress moves. All you need to do, wherever and whenever the bug bites you, is pick up the phone. If you want to turn your man on like never, first send a couple of erotic texts to him, then seek a private spot to use your mobile – it could even be in the loo!

"Then let your imagination run wild, tell him explicitly what he does to you and how randy you are feeling. You can so paint a picture of what you want from him that when you eventually meet, it wouldn't be, for him to tell you some funny stories about what a hard day he's had in the office … "

Flirting expert, Pauline, believes texting is great if used wisely. "It allows shy people to make a move", she says. "If someone replies, it probably means they want to take things further. You can also send tempting saucy messages. But it does have disadvantages. like letters and e-mails, it doesn't have the support of body language. That can be dangerous because we use body language as our fmal detector of sincerity. Without the language, a chat-up line could come across as tacky, particularly if someone doesn't know you. Texting has shortened what we say; as we shorten our words, we increase the chance of misunderstanding … "

That's a wisdom to remember this festive period if you're tempted to send a message to an old lover or attractive boss in a moment of drunken 'intoxication!' Findings have revealed that a lot of men will text someone they fancy when they're drunk. More than half of women confessed they have suffered from 'ex-texting' – sending an ill-judged message to a former partner and quite a number of users have experienced 'mistexts' accidentally sending a naughty message meant for a lover, to a 'friend' or, worse, a family'.

Careless texts can even cost lives. Some years back, Phillips IMc Nulty of Leicestershire in England, strangled his wife, Yvonne, to death with a dog lead. He had picked up her phone and just read a message: "Good morning, my darling. I feel like I have just won the lottery. I love you very much". He convinced himself that she was having an af to the wrong phone! Constant messaging can also be bad for your health. Dr. Mark Collins, head of Addiction Unit at Celeb Tetox Clinic, The Priory says he's seen a rise in 'text addiction' with some clients spending up to seven hours a day on their phone keyboards. This leads to repetitive strain injury, sleep deprivation and eye strain – plus increased agitation when they can't get to their phones. A study of children in Belgium also revealed that 10 per cent of 13-year olds are disturbed by late-night messaging, leaving them tired and unable to concentrate.

"If you expect to be woken up", reveals the study, "it changes your sleep. You sleep less deeply. It means you are effectively on call and more tired during the day".

And the downside to the text revolution? According to the report, 'it's annoying when someone's messing around with their mobile all the time. We need to learn 'text etiquette'. And it is stressful when you're contactable 24 hours a day. Maybe, we also need to learn to turn our phones off occasionally".

The report concluded that life could be even moire difficult for text rats in future. "The phone network can tell where you are, when you use your phone. In the future, you could use it to track down your kids or even your sneaky other half!" So the message is clear-think before you text!

What Grown-Ups Do! (Humour)

A little boy wakes up in the middle of the night needing to use the toilet. On the way back from the toilet, he hears a noise from his parents' bedroom, he peeps round the door and sees them in the throes of lovemaking.

Quietly, the boy creeps back to his own bedroom and wakes up his younger sister. "Come with me," he whispers and takes her to see their parents. "Look at that," he says, "and we get smacked just for sucking our thumbs!"

Return To Sender? ( Humour)

Late one night, the doctor was called out to the house of a woman expecting a baby. Unfortunately, the weather was very stormy and by the time he got there, the electricity had failed. He realised he would have to deliver the baby by candle light so he was forced to ask for the help of the woman's young five- year-old son.

30 minutes later, the baby was born and all was well, thanks in part to the young boy holding the candle. The doctor examined the new arrival and gave it a tap on the bottom to make it cry. At that point, the young son said forcefully, 'I'd smack him harder than that, he shouldn't have been up there in the first place."