Often, we find out certain things rather late in life. A lot of it happens when you're harmlessly scrolling through your Facebook newsfeed and something like this screams at you -- 'You've been doing/eating/cutting/pronouncing XYZ wrong YOUR WHOLE LIFE!
Some of it is useful, such as the fact that the original Swedish way of pronouncing 'Ikea' is 'ee-kay-ah'. It's the Americans who started pronouncing it as 'eye-key-ah'. It really bothers me sometimes because I feel like I'm one of the 3 people in the world who say 'ee-kay-ah' and I often get 'tsk tsk' looks from the 'eye-key-ah' sayers.
However, many of such articles contain just nonsense. I've often wondered why on earth I should peel the banana from the other end and why my way is 'the wrong way'. The explanation offered that 'this is how monkeys do it' does nothing for me. Please. Monkeys do a lot of things, including picking lice from each other's hair and eating it. Though I wouldn't be surprised to see an article soon with the headline 'You've been fixing your head lice problem the wrong way YOUR WHOLE LIFE!'
And this is why when I came across a TED talk about how we have all been tying our shoelaces wrong our whole lives, my first reaction was "Riiiight..." I only sat through the talk because it was only for 3 minutes. I sat there, cynically, waiting for the speaker to say 'this is how monkeys would tie shoelaces', but to my surprise, I found myself getting interested. It was such a simple trick that even using the word 'trick' seems excessive.
Once the talk was over, I went outside and grabbed my gym shoes. I tried out what the speaker had said in the talk and I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. Not only was it a more secure knot, the 'bow' looked so nice and straight and 'in place', resting perpendicular to the length of the shoe. I've been tying my shoelaces like this ever since. Even though it took me a while to put my instincts aside and remember to tie it 'the other way'.
I've decided to start Xena off on tying shoelaces using only this way. But I was so excited I decided to venture beyond shoes.
The talk is from 2005 and many of you may have already seen and implemented/dismissed it, but I thought I'd share it anyway because good things need to be shared. I, for one, was both embarrassed and amazed that I'd been tying my shoelaces 'the wrong way' MY WHOLE LIFE and found out 'the right way' so late!
Well, I guess... better late than never!
Some of it is useful, such as the fact that the original Swedish way of pronouncing 'Ikea' is 'ee-kay-ah'. It's the Americans who started pronouncing it as 'eye-key-ah'. It really bothers me sometimes because I feel like I'm one of the 3 people in the world who say 'ee-kay-ah' and I often get 'tsk tsk' looks from the 'eye-key-ah' sayers.
However, many of such articles contain just nonsense. I've often wondered why on earth I should peel the banana from the other end and why my way is 'the wrong way'. The explanation offered that 'this is how monkeys do it' does nothing for me. Please. Monkeys do a lot of things, including picking lice from each other's hair and eating it. Though I wouldn't be surprised to see an article soon with the headline 'You've been fixing your head lice problem the wrong way YOUR WHOLE LIFE!'
And this is why when I came across a TED talk about how we have all been tying our shoelaces wrong our whole lives, my first reaction was "Riiiight..." I only sat through the talk because it was only for 3 minutes. I sat there, cynically, waiting for the speaker to say 'this is how monkeys would tie shoelaces', but to my surprise, I found myself getting interested. It was such a simple trick that even using the word 'trick' seems excessive.
Once the talk was over, I went outside and grabbed my gym shoes. I tried out what the speaker had said in the talk and I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. Not only was it a more secure knot, the 'bow' looked so nice and straight and 'in place', resting perpendicular to the length of the shoe. I've been tying my shoelaces like this ever since. Even though it took me a while to put my instincts aside and remember to tie it 'the other way'.
I've tied the shoelaces on my left shoe the conventional way, and the ones on the right shoe using the new way. Can you see how much nicer the 'bow' on the right shoe looks? And yes, since I started tying them this way, my shoelaces have never come undone.
I have this dress that I love, but I'd always hated the vertical way in which the bow near the neckline would rest. I would tug and tug and tug, but it would go right back to that lop-sided state.
So I tried the new shoelace tying method, and I couldn't believe my eyes! The bow was horizontal and perfect!
Well, I guess... better late than never!
2 comments:
That shoe lace tying video is actually useful!
:)
Arun,
Hehe yeah, I found it quite enlightening. :D
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