I have this knack for invariably getting food on my face. This is while I’m eating, mind you. I should clarify that I don’t walk under stairs or go to the toilet, and end up with food on my face; it only happens when I’m legitimately eating a meal or a snack, which is not surprising, but yes, invariable. In tandem with my said knack, my mother has this habit of telling me about the food on my face… but only hours after the offending particles initially decided to bless with me with an extra nostril. 

“By the way,” she’ll say, “You have pumpkin on your face. Actually it’s been there for a while, but I didn’t feel like telling you.”

In the time it takes between food-landing-on-face and being-told-about-food-on-face, the following things have inevitably happened: I have worked my hellos throughout the entire dinner party room, I have managed to devour an entire season of Game of Thrones, the enviably fit superhumans have completed the New York marathon, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict would have worked itself out.

The point is, unknowingly getting food on my face is something I’m not terribly fond of, and I often find myself shaking my head and dejectedly thinking, “I wish I knew about this earlier.”

And thus a list is born; a list aptly titled ‘Things I wish I knew earlier’. Coming soon to a blog near you. Stay tuned.