Let’s put it this way: growing up, my nickname in our house was “Little Miss Irish Know-it-All.” And I’ve raised 4 total know-it-alls. When they come home frustrated because a teacher said “I know you know the answer. Put your hand down” and calls on someone else, I say “those who think they know it all are annoying to those of us who actually do.” Hermione Granger is the patron saint of our household.
I’m not a know it all by far, but I do read a lot so I know a bit. I got perturbed at my husband early in our marriage because I was choked a bit on a tortilla chip, and he kept asking me if I was ok. I couldn’t talk because I was mildly choking. When I finally was able to talk, he yelled at me and asked “why didn’t you answer me.” I yelled back, “ if I wasn’t OK, I’d have given you the international sign for choking!” He had gone through EMT training and asked me how I knew about that. I just told him I knew how to read!
I read a lot & I am very good at synthesizing information & applying it. I don’t think people consider me a know-it-all in a negative sense, but they often will say that they are asking me something because they feel that I know a lot about things.
Now, my older brother was a true know-it-all. He read voraciously, watched the world around him, and had a photographic memory. Unfortunately, he was not good at reading social cues, and he annoyed people when he regaled them with his knowledge. I loved Big Bang Theory, and Sheldon reminded me of my brother.
U have a headful of trivia, or as my H says ‘useless knowledge’; I would not call myself a know-it-all; I prefer, ‘well informed’ !
And for all of you weight-watchers, here’s a potentially useful piece of trivia
Celery has negative calories - It takes more calories to eat a piece of celery than the celery contains!
I knew that about celery, momo2x2018!
I was an inveterate encyclopedia, biography, history and geography reader as a kid. Have never really stopped. Map reading is definitely a lost art, and my sons are dumbfounded as to why they should learn that skill.
Always knew the obscure stuff. Being an Army brat exposed me to all kinds of places, people and things. Hermoine Granger would have been my spirit animal.
It’s easy to look up things online, but it’s not the same. Research used to take perseverance! I’ve been doing genealogy of DH’s Easter European relatives, and the and my sons have been astounded at how I take trivial pieces of things (an old life insurance policy, knowing a little Yiddish because I studied German, overlaying an 1851 map over a Google map to find an ancestor’s house) and find actual ship manifests and naturalization documents, but it all goes back to the same interest in everything that I had as a kid. Knitting it together is the fun part!
H read the encyclopedia, several times. He has retained a good bit of what he’s read and had some interesting jobs in college. He is very curious about the world around him and retains very interesting trivia. My relative used to consider himself very good at trivia until he played Trivial Pursuit with H (now he refuses to play against H or me).
My kids are each good at certain types of trivia and information. D loves European history and musicals from around Franz Joseph’s time and forward. She’s also very good at all things cinematic, since that was her major. S is good at geography and current events and the world.
None of us are very good on sports statistics or famous players. It is interesting to see what information sticks in different brains.
@CountingDown hence your user name! CountingDown the calories, LOL!
I am happy to find kindred spirits here who also read the encyclopedia as a child. I always say I know lots of useless information, mostly obtained from reading tons of books. My husband also knows lots of useless information, his is mostly from websites he browses on a daily basis. He shares much of it with me, so he is also a source of my useless information.
We had a 1941 edition of the Encyclopedia Brittanica in our house. It’s interesting having an encyclopedia that doesn’t know how World War II ends! I can’t say I ever read it all, but I did occasionally take deep dives into it. I was a foreign service brat so got exposed to a number of foreign cultures along with our own. I also tend to compulsively read every book the library has on a topic before I feel ready to tackle it. So I know all about wedding traditions, and vegetable gardening, and redoing a kitchen and childbirth and any number of other things. Can’t say I am great with cars, though I did drive a Ford Econoline outfitted as a camper around the country for nine months.
Quonset Huts. Everyone is familiar and Loves them here in Rhode Island.
Quonset Point Was home to the Navy’s SeaBee engineering corps. And developed them for the war effort. They are ubiquitous around here. The Navy Base closed but it’s now a large army and air guard station and military airport. In fact the NE Patriots fly out of Quonset and Green. Its fun to see them going down 95 with a full police laden motorcade.
Quonset is also one of the largest new car distribution hubs in the northeast. It’s remained relevant all these years later. The old fighting SeaBees statue at that gate is still in place and will never be moved imho. It’s a bumble bee in a navy cap carrying a machine gun.
Definitely not a know-it-all of any sort. I do know how to do/build/make/fix a range of things, some taught by my dad, some picked up from curiosity and trial and error. It is a good feeling to have D text me for advice and on a few occasions say, “But mom, you know everything!” if I say I don’t know a solution. The same kid that thought I didn’t know anything when she was in high school. Lol.
My father said I was a wealth of incidental information. I’m happy that my daughter is even more so. I tell her that she should try out for Jeopardy but she demurs.
There are several Jeopardy contestants on CC. Including an undefeated 5 time champ. Apparently you could only last a week of shows in the past. Not the current method that allows long winning streaks.
Someone should start a jeopardy thread to talk about getting on and winning jeopardy. A chance me thread perhaps. lol
My DD thinks I have read the entire internet; what can I say, I like to know stuff. I am curious and interested and want to know how stuff works.
I think reading is a huge part of being a know-it-all and why I was thrilled when the internet came into being. I learned to cook from Joy of cooking and I loved that book because it not only gave me good recipes, it explained the science and history behind many of them. I learned how to make a basic soup and why you you always soak dried beans, and why you don’t put the tomatoes in until the potatoes are mostly cooked. I am a huge fan of America’s Test Kitchen. When I became pregnant, I read whatever our library had on pregnancy and then bought T Berry Brazelton’s book on childcare.
However, I don’t always remember all of what I’ve read and that’s where the internet comes in handy. I am a master of the keyword search, which is really handy when your kids and husband doubt you. BTW, Thanks for the further info on quonset huts, @privatebanker and @doschicos !
It sounds like we re kindred spirits in the kitchen and in our quest for knowledge, @walkinghome. If you don’t know about this book, you might enjoy it:
https://www.amazon.com/Food-Lab-Cooking-Through-Science-ebook/dp/B00TG24C34
@doschicos ,Yes, I have checked that book out from our library and even renewed it but it’s really something that I’d like to own. I hesitate to buy a book for $30, so I’ll probably just re-check it out sometime. Thanks for the reminder though, when I saw the cover I remembered enjoying it before!