SCABs

Get Your Tips Out For The Lads – By @andrewburrell87

By Andy Burrell

Get Your Tips Out For The Lads  

A couple of years ago a man had approached me while I was busking and waved a fiver at me, asking if it was OK if he put it in but took some change. I nodded that it was fine, and as I played I watched him drop the note into my case and then lift out some coins. It was only at the end of the song that I realised he had taken his fiver as well. By that time he was long gone.

I told this story on my presentation day before busking for last year’s intake. In honour of the crook in my story, I asked the students to write down tips and drop them into my case and then to steal a pre-written tip from me.

I had a look back at some of the tips I gave out to see if I could find any wisdom that could help me reflect on life, and on my first term of SCA.

Here’s a few that I liked.

When life gives you lemonade make lemons. Life will be all like “daaaaaaamn”

Challenge the rules. Break them. Mess with the status quo. That has been a steep learning curve for me this term. I quite like rules. It really grated on me in the first few weeks when we were told to make a poster and some people put on a play or cooked a gourmet meal instead. But I’ve swiftly learnt that that’s my problem and not theirs. If you want to stand out, make lemons out of lemonade.

Something can’t be ‘new and improved’.

It’s one or the other. Pick your words carefully. Every single one should land a punch.

Something can’t be totally unique. It’s either unique or it isn’t.

See above.

In actual fact isn’t a thing. Facts are, by definition, actual. Stop saying things twice.

God, do you think I should have reigned in the grammar-fest?

The best things in life aren’t things.

I have inherited a hell of a lot this term, barely any of which is tangible. I try to live as much as I can based on one question: ‘When you’re old, will you tell your grandchildren about this?’

I hope my grandkids won’t care that I had the latest iPhone, or that my bike was real nice. Maybe, though, they’ll want to hear about the time I convinced Pret to give out hot water bottles to the homeless. I’m looking forward to making that a reality in the coming weeks.

You can’t lick your own elbow, but you can lick the elbow of the person next to you. Go on, I dare you.

This feels like a great metaphor for finding a creative partner. You’re looking for someone who can do stuff you can’t, but who will also accept your quirks and embrace your weirdness. You have to take risks, be brave and lick a few elbows.

If someone gets a bit too chummy with you call them by the wrong name to let them know you don’t care about them.

Jodie. Josef. Coco.

There’s no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong choice of clothing.

I have become the shorts guy. I didn’t set out intending for that to be a thing, it just sort of happened. Some days it’s quite cold actually. Oh well.

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