In advance of turning 30 earlier this year, I set out to collect all my knowledge. It turns out that all my knowledge can be communicated in less than 500 words.
- It is fine to dislike children, but it is not fine to go on about it; people will think you are disagreeable. If the child in question however is a particularly shit one, it is perfectly acceptable to be rude to it.
- Buses with letters in their route are both faster and more reliable than those without.
- It’s pointless to ask people what their sign is, because those worth talking to simply won’t know.
- Books from bookshops smell better; books from charity shops look better.
- Coffee is not interesting, nor are people who talk about coffee.
- It is fine to not want to go to things, and it is fine to not go to the things you don’t want to go to, and, when prompted for a reason you aren’t going to things it is fine to say that you’re not going because you don’t want to. It is not however fine to volunteer the fact that you don’t want to go to things unprompted.
- Tradesmen do not care that you have obsessive compulsive disorder, and they will think you are insane if you call on them them at emergency rates citing nothing other than “peace of mind”.
- Cat fur smells of heaven. Cat yawns smell of everything else.
- Nothing good ever became that way without an editor.
- Loneliness makes one sad, but dating apps make one sadder.
- Never, ever install an intruder alarm. Intruder alarms are good for just two things: waking up your neighbours at 2am when you are abroad, and inconveniencing legitimate houseguests. It is far more sensible to just open yourself to the possibility of being robbed.
- You must never say “vehicle” when you mean car; you must never say “humans” when you mean people; you must never say “property” when you mean house. Make your language florid and decorous, rather than flaccid and managerial.
- People who want to understand people learn lexicography. People who want to understand everything else learn mathematics. People who want to understand happiness learn nothing at all.
- Never trust a silicon seal.
Matthew Weldon's Dangerous Thoughts 