Abbreviations

Hi Everyone!
Sorry I am behind. However,  I am waiting for SOMEONE to send me some pictures so I can properly fill you in on my Christmas break!

I am working on responding to emails and procrastinating. One of the things I have realized recently is  that I have conflicting feelings about abbreviations. This is probably because my mother hated them so much. I was taught to say, "Yes" instead of "Ok" because that word was not "proper" English. What does OK even stand for? [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okay] If the word "Whatev" came out of my mouth I would probably be grounded depending on the context and how I innotated.

This, of course, was all before the prevalence of the internet & before me or any of my friends had cell phones. In the year 2009 (...I am being generous) when my mom figured out how to text she has changed her stance on this issue.  For example, I receive "When R U coming home?" pretty frequently.

After being surrounded by people who are not native speakers of English (and English people for that matter!!) I am frequently exposed to abbreviations on a daily basis. Many of them I never knew existed!
When typing and texting I often have to consult friends to decipher the meaning of some responses I receive.

I have discovered two categories of abbreviations:

The first I consider to be Necessary Abbreviations. This is the style of abbreviations that I feel comfortable using. An example would be the text above, or many are acronyms. The main reason for using these would be to save time in a realtime chat (fbook, gchat), or maybe to simplify a fast text message.  I am not a fabulous writer, and I cannot spell!!!! The abbreviations have a purpose for making things easier and messaging more efficient. To me, there is a significant difference in typing "over the top" and simply putting OTT.

Some examples:
fb=facebook
brb= be right back
wtf= "welcome to facebook"
smh=shaking my head
ott=over the top  (This one is British! It's really fun to use, try it!)
omg= oh my gosh
bff=best friend forever (bf= is boyfriend , which is is why this is different)

Ones I use... but probably should not:
ppl= people
u=you

The second category are Unnecessary Abbreviations. They completely baffle me.
Some examples based on an anonymous & completely random messages I have received via text or Facebook.

1. miss ya loadz!, hpe u gud thoug!


-loadz- not an abbreviation, but WHY the z and not the s?
-hpe=hope*
-gud=good
-thoug=though*

Some more: 
ve=have
dem=them
da=the
ma=my
ya=you
wat=what

I have never heard anyone say "da" instead of "the".  It is just one letter short of the real word so why not just type "the"?  Changing "my" to "ma" doesn't really make sense to me either. Why not just put the correct letter? 


I suppose "ve" instead of "have" you are saving typing two characters. 

Can anyone explain this to me?

Well,  I am now off to a virtual group meeting via Skype. I am pretty excited to see how this works!

I miss everyone back home. xoxo