Tag: Knowledge

Copied To Your Clipboard

I have long considered myself a trivia enthusiast – I love to know things, and I don’t mean that in the nosey sense. Long-time visitors to this blog might recall this interest from my university quiz days, and back then it served my friends and I very well. Generally speaking, it still does. Every now and then, however, it backfires a little bit. Allow me to demonstrate what I’m talking about.

One of my strongest areas trivia-wise has always been popular culture – TV and music in particular. And when you spend as much time as I do reading about both online, algorithms start to recognise this, so you find yourself presented with more and more posts about each on social media. Of course, it’s the same on every platform, be it Facebook, X (forever Twitter, whether Elon likes it or not), Instagram or anything else – certain posts will interest me, others less so. I scroll mindlessly through those that aren’t so captivating, and apparently, I sometimes do that with a very heavy finger. Imagine my surprise when I whizzed past one article the other day, only for my phone to surprise me with a message:

“Copied to your clipboard: AN INTERVIEW WITH SIMPLE MINDS’ JIM KERR…”

It wasn’t just the title, either. That was followed by the rest of the text! Now, I neither like nor dislike Simple Minds. Like a lot of artists, I judge their output on a track-by-track basis. Having said that, though, I might not have lived it down if I’d accidentally copied Jim’s thoughts on his latest album into the family WhatsApp chat.

Mason

Things I Wish I Knew As a Teenager

​I’ve been an adult for a little while now and have spent some time learning a little bit about just what that means. Having said that, though, I’ve also had time to reflect on my time spent as a teenager. So here’s a few things I wish I knew back then.

1. People will bitch and backstab and gossip. As will you. Don’t take it to heart.

2. Work hard and save as much as you can. Trust me, you’ll need it.

3. Everyone has struggles. Everyone has their shit. Some just hide it better than others.

4. You don’t have to do things or squash yourself down just to fit in.

5. Before you stress about something, consider if it’ll matter in five years’ time.

6. Take pictures. Every chance you get. Everyone you love. You will treasure them.

7. It’s okay to not like things everyone else likes. And vice versa.

8. It doesn’t matter if you’re popular, unpopular or somewhere in between. It doesn’t make a blind bit of difference the minute you’re out of school and into the real world.

9. Find your passion and don’t let anyone laugh at you for it.

10. It’s okay to not know what you want to do with your life. I’ve already changed the career I was working towards three times, and gone back into education twice since A-Levels.

11. Honesty really is the best policy. People value it and you’ll value it in other people.

12. No one has it all figured out. I don’t now, and I doubt I will when I’m 80. That’s just life, I guess.

Emily