'Oregon Trail' Gen X Nerd

Image from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Love_vs._Hate.jpg Note what's wrong, appreciate what's good (CW: some strong language) by Jen Davies, nerd July 15, 2026 In an era when people earn an income on social media via watches and click-throughs (and ads), I find myself being choosy about what content I engage with because there are lots of such people who aren't interested in truth. They don't feel the need to fairly represent whatever thing they're talking about. Their headlines are typically  clickbait (surprising or controversial) because all they want is to get paid by having you look at their content. And I can tell from the trends in the bylines for all that click-so-I-get-paid content that negative things get more clicks: shitposting, criticism, and tearing down must get views, even though I myself choose not to engage with it. It actually isn't hard to write that stuff either, I don't think, just put your blinders on and get mad, so I rese...

  The soundtrack in the back of my head by Jen Davies, nerd July 8, 2026 Today's blog has a soundtrack! It isn't necessary though. https://youtu.be/cD7MuSTu7ss Ludovico Einaudi: Fox Tracks (Day 3) I have only experienced life in two ways: long periods of time when music is essential to existing day to day, and long periods when my head is too full of ideas to accommodate much music in there. I'm currently in a strange period when I seem to be able to handle both: I'm not as quick to push the ideas out into the world, but I'm still able to do it and make space for music. In fact, with music playing I find it a little easier to sit at my desk (a constant problem: making myself sit down and DO it, so you can imagine how difficult writing my doctoral thesis was). My relationship with music began early, because both my parents loved it and played it pretty much daily. I also grew up in the 1980s and had the benefits of children's television with incredible music, es...

Image from https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/61719320 Making friends as an adult: "THAT one" by Jen Davies, nerd July 1, 2026 Making friends as an adult is a lot harder than making friends as a child. As a child in school, there are typically two dozen kids in a class (and more in the overall school) who might be candidates, and you spend 6 or 7 hours every day with them, forced to interact in class and at recess and on the bus. Kids in the neighbourhood you live in are all often versed in the same set of 5 or 10 games (jump rope, Tag, or Minecraft), so they're all candidates for friendship too. As an adult, you never know what someone is "into" - the range gets a lot broader as we get older and we have different life experiences and develop different interests. We get pickier and more set in our ways, too (that's a different topic for another blog post). Our pool of candidates often gets smaller as well: we aren't surrounded by two-dozen or mo...

Image from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junk_drawer Adding to your "junk drawer" by Jen Davies, nerd June 24, 2026 Please let me invite you first to watch Hank Green's video, No Effort is Wasted (25 minutes): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgBaU9mmceQ The rest of this blog will make a lot more sense. As a career counsellor I've seen a lot of people who are concerned about the outcome of a particular effort. If I do X, will I get Y? Like, if I take on this project at work, will my boss give me a raise? I see a similar concern in the Save #TheHuntforBenSolo fan campaign. If we do Z can we be sure to get a Ben Solo movie? And the answer to both of those questions is unsatisfying. As wise scientist and negotiator Ben Franklin gets credit for telling us, the only guarantees in life are death and taxes. We can rarely be 100% certain of the outcome of a social behaviour because people are complex. Occasionally someone will then express the idea that maybe they shouldn...

Image from https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093779/ The movies we have obsessed over June 10, 2026 by Jen Davies, nerd Last week I hosted a Watch Party for the #TheHuntForBenSolo fan campaign, and I noted that I have now seen the featured film - 65 - 8 or 9 times now, and that's a lot for me. I rarely revisit movies or TV shows. Something has to really grip me to get me to rewatch.  And it got me wondering about the movies I have obsessed over. Which movies have YOU obsessed over? Do you think it says anything about us? Childhood... The Princess Bride Willow SW Ep456 things with puppets I cannot remember a time when I did not know Star Wars (original trilogy). My father showed it to me as soon as he thought I could handle it, and I know I saw all three movies in the first home that I can remember. We moved from there when I was 7, so I know I had seen all three by that age. Likely thanks to Frank Oz's Yoda, I loved rewatching The Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock for years, which had...

Image from https://freesvg.org/shuttermonkey-movie-clapperboard Movies I'm glad I saw, but I won't rewatch by Jen Davies, nerd June 17, 2026 Last week I wrote about films I've seen a LOT . This week, here are films I've seen only once (and I'm glad I did even though I never want to see them again). I don't think I'm the only one who has only so-much tolerance for films with particular kinds of content. For me, I don't do high levels of violence well (especially not horror movie-type gore - like, the whole Saw series seems like just an ongoing repetition and I don't understand why there is more than one). I can tolerate some sex in a movie (brief scenes that have a story purpose). I don't care either way if there is a romantic plot, and I actively avoid romcoms. And yet I try to avoid spoilers before seeing movies that I know I'm interested in, so certainly I'm exposed to all of those things regularly. Here are a few films that I saw, whic...