Tag: Facts

DEAR TRIVIA: I THOUGHT I WAS SMART, THANK YOU FOR THE EGO CHECK

Have you ever wondered how smart you are? Not book smart, per se, but life smart? How much general knowledge do you contain about things that may, or may not, be helpful to you in some capacity throughout life? If your answer is no, then why even continue? I have to believe you can guess where this post is going and it’s pretty much strictly for anyone ever who thought, I need to prove my brain skills against strangers at a local bar on a weeknight – AKA trivia night.

I know for a fact that my general knowledge, and overall trivia skills, are pretty much worthless. There isn’t a lot of room in my head for random tidbits of things. Because it’s full of other items like how to do my job, how much I love my dog, figuring out how to feed myself a healthy amount of times each day, remembering to do chores, memorizing every single Chipotle location within 15 miles of where I live, etc. You know, crucial survival skills basically. 

However, my job title makes people believe that somehow my IQ is at least average, if not exponentially above that mark. And so they frequently tell me how smart I am. Which causes some internal dilemmas until my ego takes over and I make poor decisions … like smack talking other trivia teams. Despite knowing deep in my soul that I’m not able to back it up. Remember growing up when there would be kids who would crush school and kids who would crush life? Book smart versus street smart. And I always believed you were somewhere on that spectrum. Until I became an adult with free evenings and friends.

There is a third type of smart, I’ve learned. Trivia smart. This is a person who just knows things. Not current things necessarily. Not political things necessarily. Not natural events necessarily. Not history necessarily. Not even sports necessarily. No. These people know stuff in every possible category over all of eternity. How?! I genuinely want to know so I can stop losing and embarrassing myself every Tuesday night. 

For starters, where are you getting this information? Google? Reddit? The newspaper? I honestly don’t know. I scroll through the major news headlines every day and have yet to contribute to a current events conversation in one of my group chats because the stuff they talk about I have to re-research. And by the time I have any facts the convo has taken a massive diversion and I’m just confused again. It’s a cycle of playing catch-up and not in a good way.

My next question for these trivia geniuses, is how do you retain this information? My boss has to remind me every morning of our daily standup meeting and I’ve been working there for months. One would think that I would have learned how to open my calendar by now, and yet here we are. Especially if it’s some random fact. That usually goes in one ear and out the other. If you asked me 15 minutes after reading it what the statue’s name was and why it was taken down, it would be a good day if I answered half of those questions. Maybe I never really learned how to “read”? Because it seems to me like I read to get something over with and other people read to learn. So clearly one of us is doing it wrong and one of us is winning trivia. I’ll let you figure out who goes where in that equation.

On the bright side, every trivia team needs that person who is simply there for entertainment, friendship, and alcohol. I am that person. I own that spot on the team. I’m also great at writing their answers down. So they don’t have to stop eating the plate of nachos in front of them. My greatest contribution to my team thus far, has been embellishing us with a name worthy of all the trophies. Not saying that I nailed it, but like, I absolutely nailed it and we are iconically the best-named team each week. No big deal, I’m kind of great at being creative, though apparently not as great at knowing useful things. You decide which is more fun.

Alright, jumping off my pedestal for now. If you know someone who would enjoy this post and want to share it with them, that would be awesome. Sharing is caring, after all. Don’t forget to subscribe to get these in your inbox twice weekly and follow TRP on Twitter for frequent musings. Thanks for reading!

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THE MILLENNIAL CRISIS: I DON’T CARE ABOUT ANYTHING, YET I HAVE OPINIONS ABOUT EVERYTHING

Have you ever met someone who can pull random old facts out of their brains on command? Fact fairies. Evidence elves. Truth trolls. No matter what you call it, they’re not of this world. It’s genuinely a skill – you’ll be mid-conversation about how efficient you are with conserving toilet paper on each trip to the restroom and they will throw out a gem like ‘every time you lick a stamp, it’s technically 1/10 of a calorie’. How does one respond to that? My opinions were focused on how many sheets are too many sheets and you’ve caught me off guard with calorie counting. I need a second, if you don’t mind, to slow this high speed spinning opinion and come back to where I left you.

Facts are harder to know. You need stuff like evidence, to make people accept it. To get this evidence, you have to research and with research you have to properly credit the source so there’s no risk of plagiarizing. Even if it’s a conversation between you and your dog – if there’s a hidden bug in the room and someone is really out to get you, they could take you down for not properly quoting the website on whence thou didst read it < taken from my limited knowledge of how some really old people used to write in a time long, long, long, long, long ago. Probably before the dinosaurs #reference #bibliography #facts.

Opinions, however, need zero backing. Zero proof of any sort of validity. They do, ironically, need the opinion reference to make sure no one asks for a follow-up on where these ideas came from. A simple ‘in my opinion’, ‘I think’, ‘that’s just my opinion’, etc. will do just fine. These statements are completely customizable to the user. 

The only real downfall to opinions, is that anyone, and I mean anyone, can contradict you. Then you run the risk of looking, well, a bit dumb if I’m honest. Guess that’s the price you pay for avoiding the effort of learning something. Some opinions are very insightful, though. You could actually get a new perspective, which arguably is more valuable than knowing how much the biggest pumpkin ever grown weighs. 

There’s a time and a place for facts. A good rule of thumb I like to live by is that if there is money involved, facts are probably recommended. Now, I realize this is a broad statement so I’ll clarify my opinion to help enlighten you. If you are paying to be there (hello college!), then the professors could care less what late-night epiphany you had on margarita Monday. Your friends, on the other hand, are probably all for it. They may even be contributing to your nightly indulgence to better enjoy their part of the experience.

Another scenario – if someone is paying you, and you are not a social influencer / celebrity / famous outside of your hometown / being actively sought out and followed by people you don’t know on the gram / etc. then facts are a safer bet. Unless of course you get paid to share your opinions, in which case, bravo! Are there exceptions to this theory? For sure, but I don’t care enough to explore them. If you’re stressed about which to use (fact or opinion), go with your gut. Better yet, don’t care what people think and live your life like nobody’s watching.

In theory. Like nobody’s watching, in theory. Because there are actually a LOT of people watching everything that you do. We’re all like zoo animals today except that you don’t have to actually leave your couch. You can see everyone online. Sort of like a horror version of Back to the Future – maybe that’s what the modern remake will be. We all know it’s coming, clearly all the “new” movies are based on timeless classics because the writers are where? On strike? Who knows.

Alright, jumping off my pedestal for now. If you know someone who loves facts, tell them to stop one-upping you. If you, like mwah, love a solid opinion, know that we are in this together. Thanks for reading!

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