It all started with ants. Ordinary, everyday garden ants that I watched for hours as a child, fascinated by their silent, coordinated movements. How did they communicate so effectively without words? The answer, of course, was chemical signaling—pheromones. Those tiny scent breadcrumbs guiding their colony mates to food sources and warning of dangers with more efficiency than any human emergency broadcast system. Fast forward twenty years, and I found myself in my makeshift home lab,…
I’ve always found it a bit strange how much we notice each other’s lunches at work. I mean, we’re all adults with jobs to do, yet somehow what’s inside those plastic containers becomes this whole unspoken thing that everyone’s hyper-aware of but pretends not to be. The first time I realized this weird office lunch hierarchy was a thing, I was at my previous job – a marketing agency in Manchester where I’d been working…
There is a special ring of hell dedicated to commuters, but it’s does not have flames or lava. Instead, they are tortured by being imprisoned inside a metal tube filled with strangers. It is as if everyone is suffering through an apocalypse together. There are no displays of courtesy as everyone acts as if Gordon Ramsay is ready to launch into a tirade. I understand this suffering all too well given that the last fifteen…
I used to think I was reasonably tech-savvy. I mean, I’ve got all the usual apps on my phone, I can troubleshoot basic computer issues, and I even set up my mum’s smart TV last Christmas (a feat that deserved a medal, honestly). But then I started at this fancy marketing agency about eight months ago, and blimey, was I in for a rude awakening. On my first day, after the usual awkward introductions and…
Last Tuesday, I found myself staring at my to-do list with the same horrified fascination usually reserved for discovering new bacterial colonies growing in forgotten lunch containers. The list had somehow spawned 47 distinct items, each breeding sub-tasks that were rapidly colonizing every corner of my planning app. That’s when it hit me – what I was witnessing wasn’t just poor time management. It was an ecological disaster unfolding in digital form. Look, I’ve always…
Every January I make the same promise to myself. This year will be different. This year, I’ll finally become one of those glowing, vibrant people who radiates health and has boundless energy. And the vehicle for this transformation? A tall, pale green glass of celery juice on an empty stomach every single morning. It’s become something of a yearly ritual for me now – buying a juicer I swear I’ll use daily, filling my fridge…
I first encountered SentenceSmith (not its real name, but close enough that the company’s legal team would definitely still send me threatening emails) about seven months ago when my friend Tyler texted me a link with the message “dude check this out it’s wild.” Tyler works in marketing at a mid-sized tech company and has the uncanny ability to discover every new digital tool approximately three weeks before it hits mainstream awareness. He once made…
It all started innocently enough – a casual observation over lunch with Mei in the university cafeteria. “Have you ever noticed,” I said, gesturing wildly with a fork full of questionable pasta, “that Derek from Accounting does the exact same sequence of movements every time he approaches Jessica at reception? It’s like watching a bizarre courtship ritual.” Mei glanced up from her molecular modeling papers. “You mean like those birds you were obsessed with last…
I’ve lost count of how many notebooks I have filled with amazing workshop insights that have never seen the light of day. Forty-three, if you’re asking for an exact number, which I know because they’re stacked in a neat tower in my home office – a physical monument to my eternal optimism and spectacular follow-through failure. You know how it goes. You see an ad for a workshop that promises to teach you exactly what…
I’ve tried approximately 347 productivity systems in my lifetime. I’ve bullet journaled, time-blocked, and pomodoro-ed my way through countless workdays. I’ve downloaded apps that turn productivity into a game, apps that lock me out of social media, and apps that supposedly analyze my “focus patterns” (which, as it turns out, don’t exist). The result? My to-do list is longer than ever, and I’ve added “feel guilty about productivity apps I paid for but don’t use”…