Skittles and SunChips, Snowballs and Information Overload

Every day, or maybe that’s every hour, new information is foisted upon us. It’s not easy taking it all in, evaluating it, putting it into context and perspective. There is a nonstop flow of serious statistics, news updates, guidelines and regulations, and they are important to consider and absorb.

Yet, we are told, it is also important that we do not allow what the World Health Organization has called an “infodemic” to become all-consuming. Amid all that information, there is value in trying to take a little time each day to reflect on the less-serious, on small moments of the absurd, on bits of collected wisdom, such as it is, from friends and family and personal experience in this recent past.

• It can snow in the Hamptons in May—enough to make a snowball, even.
• Despite scientific-sounding reports to the contrary, Skittles do not all taste the same.
• You should wear pants on a Zoom call.
• A “planking challenge” is not a sustainable daily activity.
• The sewing skills I acquired in 9^thgrade Home Economics do not even qualify me to make a no-sew mask.
• Cutting your own hair does not come without risks.
• Surprisingly, people with kids seemed to have no idea how hard a teacher’s job is.
• Binge watching The Office may in fact count as professional development.
• “Organize the garage” is never ever going to move up to the top of any “To Do” list.
• There is a person in the world named Joe Exotic, and for some reason, people care.
• Your bed can be a desk, a film set and a kitchen prep station, all within a single hour.
• The last SunChip in the bag is the most coveted SunChip in the bag.
• If you don’t hit mute while on a conference call, people just might hear you flush the toilet.
• Learning a new language in mere weeks is not absolutely necessary.
• It is impossible to walk 10,000 steps a day when you’re only moving between the den and the bathroom.
• You cannot watch The Shawshank Redemption too many times.
• Cake contains eggs, and can therefore be considered a nutritious breakfast.
• Shaving every day is not a necessity, but neither is growing a mustache that makes you look like a NASCAR driver from 1973.
• Texas Hold ’Em is an invaluable game to teach your teenage daughter, but not one to play for high stakes once she’s mastered it.
• Downward Dog is likely the first and last yoga position I will ever attempt.
• I could be convinced that Blue Raspberry is actually a fruit.
• Every action of an entire day can be described in song, in real time, to the show-stopping melody of “On My Own” from Les Miserables.
• Rubik’s Cube still isn’t fun.
• Training a cat to use the toilet is considered, by some, to be a “life skill.”
• Lists like this grow exponentially when passed around, and there is no end to the amount of inane knowledge we can share.