Blah blah blah. This is why you don't leave writing to the last minute! Because all of a sudden Blah blah blah starts to look good! You start to convince yourself of its 'edginess'. You tell yourself it would be so 'avant garde' to publish Blah blah blah. You begin to see the deeper artistic … Continue reading Blah blah blah →

The patrons start to notice the escort. One waiter simultaneously holding up the cake and preventing the candles from going out, flanked on either side by more waiters. The diners know the drill. Their individual conversations cease as they join in the restaurant staff's song. Everyone knows the words. The strangers pause whilst those in … Continue reading Happy Birthday Dear (mumble mumble) →

The big game is coming up. The final to end all finals. Everyone will be watching you. You think you're going to be sick with the nerves. Then the game starts and you recognise the sport. The match begins and you remember you've been playing this game for years. 'Oh yeah, I know what to … Continue reading Big game nerves →

Hydro technician sounds a lot more impressive than water boy and beverage experience optimisation can hide the reality (just adding more coffee cups whenever we ran out) behind a veil of grandeur.Alternatively utilising metaphors and similes trigger imagery in the audience's head.'It was like whack-a-mole''It's like pushing against the ocean'.To try and create a rule … Continue reading Intelligent or understood →

In a previous blog post I spoke about how convergent thinking arrives too soon. We rarely get to silence the critic in our head for long enough to have a good idea. Which is a shame because we weren't always like this. Remember when you were 5 and the ideas just flew off the top … Continue reading Come on now be realistic →

Apparently nobody butters up Chris Rock anymore. They just go straight for the ... "Hey man, can I have $5,000?" No preamble, no compliments and no pretending to care how he is, just straight to the point. Now if Chris Rock didn't get good at saying no, he'd have no more money to give. If … Continue reading Say no to save yourself →

Why don't we do it earlier? Then we'd have to change all the invites and finish earlier which would mean changing the schedule too and that's a hack and a half. What if we got the Excelsior package? We don't have enough money for that and it's too late to upgrade. Ok what if we … Continue reading Convergent v divergent →

Apparently responding with empathy does not mean listing off a ton of ways to solve their problem.Whenever I heard problems or ruminated on my own difficulties I always thought brainstorming solutions was the most beneficial exercise.But it turns out that can be quite off-putting to others.Replying with empathy also doesn't mean getting angry on their … Continue reading Replying with empathy →

You have 900 unread emails in your inbox.You'd love to reply to each and every one of them but there's 900 of them!Where do you even start? 900! Inbox zero is so far away you feel likes it's an impossible achievement.Also 900 is not a static number, everyone else is not going to pause their … Continue reading 900 unread emails →

To further my hypothesis that one must understand the plot before they can rave about a story, I think this is true because of the inevitable discussions that follow. People like to talk about novels & movies and people often ask what your favourite movie is. If you say Interstellar there's a good chance you'll … Continue reading Understanding before selling →