I'm just jealous she's more successful than I am

“I need to make a spoof Twitter account of you,” I was told by a friend in the wee hours of this morning. As he has a love for all things Gossip Girl related, I’ll call him Z. Being as the foundation of our friendship thus far has been insulting each other via every social networking means possible, this statement was pretty tame on his part. After all, it was 1.00 am, and he had just finished telling me I reminded him of a duck; a change from his usual screeches of YOUR BUM IS SO BIG AND YOU HAVE NO HAIR. You’ve probably guessed by now, but explaining Z to people who have yet to encounter him is difficult at the best of times.

Despite his past exploits (including, but not limited to, “gossip blasting” exaggerated events in my private life via his Swansea-themed homage to GG) I brushed off his remark and told him I was off to bed.

“But I’m not done yet!” Perhaps I should have asked exactly what he wasn’t done with, but bed seemed a more appealing option. Typing our goodnights, little did I know Z would be tapping away on Twitter, giggling to himself as he created @GuardianCresci, my far more successful and only marginally more ridiculous alter-ego working at the Guardian as a columnist dedicating herself to “short people struggles”, meaning a required distaste for the tall.

Throughout this morning, my Blackberry pinged and blinked as @GuardianCresci tweeted away, exposing @elenacresci as the spoof account du jour. “Clena Eresci”… – Any relation?” wrote one Cardiff Newspaper graduate on my Facebook wall after @GuardianCresci approached him and others to “start our own paper together! We’d be the #dreamteam“. My Mum found it hilarious, while other friends lamented they hadn’t thought of it first. “You gotta hand it to Z…” Becca, one of the new Siren editors, told me, “@GuardianCresci is hilarious.”

…40 Tweets, 131 Following and 13 Followers later, I think you could say I’ve learnt never to underestimate Z again! Having a spoof account is like walking through a house of mirrors; watching an alternate version of yourself, twisted and magnified almost beyond recognition, but still looking eerily like you. I’ve spent most of my morning giggling at our shared love of Germans, her passion for the plight of the vertically challenged as well as her tips for those wanting to achieve the perfect shade of red hair.

My favourite spoof Tweet so far? Possibly the one about practicing shorthand “until my fingers bleed”, or even the lament to @Frost_J about waking up to an “out-of-date e-mail coupon on red hair dye”.

So does this mean I’ve “made it” now that I have a spoof Twitter account?