Things you know NOTHING about that everyone else does

[Hot Pepsi]

The first truly indisputable "computer game" as we would know them today was Space War in 1962. Note: WAR. You could argue that the 2600 was late to the party by 1977!

That's true. I'd forgotten about that. I don't remember anything other than the "pong" games that shortly preceded the 2600 era. And of course the golden age of arcade games had a lot of shooting - Defender, Space Invaders, Missile Command, Battlezone, etc.

[gavc23]

Films, or at least any film made after about 1994 that isn’t aimed at the under 10s.

I’ve been to the cinema once in about a decade, that was to see the My Little Pony Movie last year.

It’s not in a Michael Owen “I saw a film once, they’re not for me” way, more that if I find myself with a couple of hours I can think of things I’d rather do. On the odd occasion I’d like to watch a film I’ll spend ages scrolling through Sky Cinema and having no idea what I’m looking at.

The kids watch loads of them, so I’m well up on Pixar and the rest having seen most kids films more times than it’s possible to count (doubt that anyone has seen the Jonathon Frakes directed Thunderbirds film with Bill Paxton and Ben Kingsley more than I have) but for anything above a 12 certificate, nothing.

[Gawpus]

To dd's 'Kings and queens', for a while now my bedtime reading – in large part because I go to bed much later than my girlfriend and can't very well turn the bedside lamp on to read a proper book* – has been the Wikipedia pages of every monarch of England (I'm going to go back and do the Scottish and Welsh ones afterwards), starting with Alfred the Great.

There's a podcast (there's always a podcast) called Rex Factor that does exactly this (going through the monarchs from Alfred on) that might be of interest to you Sam - they do go into a bit of the wider context of each era too. They've done England and just finished Scotland I believe.

[Sam]

Ooh I might have a look for that, thanks. Although I'm crap at listening to podcasts. I'll give it a go though!

[Stumpy Pepys]

How to keep a plant alive.

I was exactly the same until I bought a soil meter. Now I have the opposite problem--the fuckers have grown too big.

[Stumpy Pepys]

As previously confessed, electricity. No understanding at all. Is it a 'thing', a chemical, black magic? No idea. None. Not even a rudimentary understanding of a watt or a volt or anything.

That said, I can successfully rewire a lamp. Make of that what you will.

I'm the same and I used to make a living editing and writing science publications. I mean I have a reasonable understanding of quantum physics and general relativity, despite their frankly bizarre implications, but I just can't get my head around electricity, whatever analogies I'm presented with. And Christ knows I've tried.

But to be fair, I don't think the vast majority of the population understand electricity.

I'm quite good at electrics though. And I also know nothing about cars.

[George]

But to be fair, I don't think the vast majority of the population understand electricity.

Most regular electricians probably don't either, God only knows I don't really. All we know is that if you put this wire here and that wire there whatever you're looking to feed should work. The science behind it is left to the eggheads who write the regulations.

[HORN]

My car knowledge came virtue of having just enough money to buy a crap car, having no job, so needing to fix it myself whenever it went wrong.

Having no job meant I could spend days fiddling, deconstructing, reassembling.

I bet the queen knows naff all about cars.

You car ignoramuses can consider your lack of knowledge a sign of success, or at the very least a sign of successfully living within your means.

[pebblethefish]

...Or possibly that we're so unsuccessful that we've never learned to drive, much less buy a car...