It used to be a quick routine. Turn on my computer in the morning, check weather.com so I have some idea of what to wear, then WebMail for the essential school-related e-mails.

But with each passing day, as I become more involved with social networking Web sites, the constant checking takes up more and more of my day.

There are personal e-mails to read on Yahoo!, friend requests to approve on my last.fm page, connections to add on my LinkedIn page and friend updates to examine on Facebook.

And then there's Twitter.

Not one to miss out on any of the social networking fads, I signed up for Twitter last weekend.

This is actually my third Twitter page, after deleting the first two after frustration and sheer boredom. The language of @s and #s is confusing to me, and the same annoying inquiry always beckons: What are you doing?

Well, Twitter, I'm too busy to answer that burning question right now -- there are too many other social networking sites that demand my immediate attention.

(On second thought, I really can't type that as a response, can I? It is well over the 140-character limit.)

However, others apparently don't share my troubles with Twitter.

According to a Pew Internet & American Life Project survey released on Oct. 21, 19 percent of Internet users employ Twitter or other social networking sites to share their statuses or to see others' statuses. The survey also reports that in April, just months before, only 11 percent of Internet users were sharing their statuses.

And while in January there were only 2.4 million tweets per day, the number jumped to 26 million tweets per day by October, according to The New York Times.

To add to these circumstances, it seems like more people are exchanging sensitive material with the help of social networking sites. This is not a problem unique to Twitter, but it became especially clear to me after reading an article in Monday's New York Times.

The article focused on Twitter's role in news coverage of last week's Fort Hood shootings. Upon visiting Twitter, readers could quickly find reactions from people who were in the area at the time of the incident.

The Times article included status updates from Tweeter RicoRossi, who works at a clinic near the Army base and posted the following on his Twitter page: "a soldier i treated here said he was waiting in line @ SRP when another soldier stood up and started shooting."

Later, he posted, "I dont want 2 b 2 graphic so ill stop there, he was there ... it was like something out of a movie he said im paraphrasing of course" [sic].

It's great to receive up-to-the-minute updates on breaking stories, and Twitter is a good recreational outlet to release information. However, in situations like this, a 140-character tweet really just scratches the surface of a much broader issue. It minimizes the important nuances of the story, and it can often contribute to rumors and misinformation. Doing justice to sensitive situations like the above requires more attention than can be found in a tweet or two.

If nothing else, this story -- and my third unsatisfactory venture into the world of Twitter -- have shown me that I need to cut back on my networking sites. I'm positive there are better uses for my time. Maybe even ones that include, say, human interaction.

So I'm afraid that my third Twitter page will soon join the others in unemployment and eventual deletion. Perhaps my paltry collection of "followers" should be prepared to read a new update from me: Deleting my Twitter account. Catch me in the real world.

Ah, and that's delightfully under the 140-character limit.