As the world winds its way back to ‘normality’ following the Covid-19 pandemic, there is the prospect of increased social interaction. However, I now find myself somewhat bamboozled by the prospect of actually having full-on conversations with other people...in real life. This is especially tricky when the topics du jour have been covered. There’s only so many times you can discuss the latest case-numbers, Covid rules and how you see the future of office working, before needing to move on to other topics.
Thankfully, I have recently rediscovered Emergency Questions, a book that claims to contain ‘1001 conversation savers for every occasion.’ Leafing through, you can see what the contributors were trying to do: Stimulate random discussions with (very) unusual prompts. Many of the questions are tongue-in-cheek, some questions are plain weird and others cannot be printed here. However, many do have the potential to be quite revealing, even in a discussion with someone you know well, or require the recollection of dim and distant memories. So, in the interests of ‘getting back out there,’ here are some Emergency Questions... complete with my honest responses.
Emergency Questions (EQ): Do you have a nickname that has since been dispensed with?
Peter Edwards (PE): Yes. On the first day of a university industrial placement, I was provided with a security pass that read ‘Peter Ewards’. The fact that this went unnoticed for several weeks only added to the ‘hilarity’ when the error was finally spotted (not by me). I became ‘Eee-wards’ for the rest of the placement. We never found out if the real Peter Ewards ever stole my pass.
EQ: How long would you cope if the internet died?
PE: If I’d just gone to bed, I would manage the night. If it was the weekend, I could get away with it for about half a day before wanting to Google something to win a minor dispute with Mrs Edwards. If it was a work day, there would be big problems. I am not a roofer.
EQ: What is the best thing that has ever happened on your birthday?
PE: The Global CemProcess Conference - I’m not telling you which year!
EQ: What is the furthest you have driven in a single day? Did anything remarkable happen?
PE: I once travelled back from a friend’s wedding in the Highlands of Scotland to London, a distance of around 800km (500 miles), as one of two drivers. It would have been fine if we hadn’t been driving in sideways rain for most of the journey. There was an element of racing the clock too, as I had to be up at 05:00 the following morning to catch a train to France.
EQ: In films snowmen always come to life. If that happened, would you be happy or freaked out?
PE: Totally freaked out, unless it was Olaf from Frozen. He seems ‘armless.
EQ: What is something nice and uncommercialised in your country and how would you ruin it?
PE: Indian restaurants are renowned in the UK for being independently run and generally pretty good. It’s about time someone took over loads and loads of these family-run enterprises and cynically made them really bland and indistiguishable... like Nandos.
EQ: What is the worst movie you have ever been forced to sit through?
PE: At university my house-mate suggested we see one of the Fast and Furious movies. It was dire and we should have left after a few minutes, but we had invested a lot of pennies in the film and, as impoverished students, we stayed until the end. Incidentally I had one of my best ever cinema experiences in the same screen shortly afterwards. The director’s cut of Alien, starting at midnight.
EQ: What is the most embarrassing photo on display in your house?
PR: Take your pick from an assortment of 16 small ones above my desk that were given to me by my sister as a birthday present. There’s one of me in a cardboard box aged 15 months, for example.
Luckily we haven’t had many visitors of late, but hopefully I will have to hide the photos soon!
