This week Apple ‘gifted’ U2’s new album to me.

Gee thanks. It’s honestly more of a hassle removing it from my library than it’s worth.

Here I was thinking nothing could kill my high spirits on Saturday night, chilling with my friends with my iPhone innocently playing my favourite tunes on shuffle, then I hear the whiny, monotoned voice of Sir Bono.

Reaching all new high’s of creepiness, Apple automatically updated my phone to include 11 U2 tracks from their newest album in an apparent publicity stunt that coincided with the release of the iPhone 6 and Apple Watch. Blah blah blah.

WE DON’T WANT YOUR SHIT MUSIC.

Apparently Apple just wanted to remind us that the majority of our personal devices are solely controlled by Apple, and consequentially the majority of our lives.

Cheers for the reminder Apple, you self important flogs.

And people say theatre is a dying art form. I went to see Les Miserables last week. Such an incredible production with a flawless cast.

I feel as though today we all live in such a artificially produced media sphere. We often forget the importance and effectiveness of personal human emotion.

An avid fan of the film adaptation of Les Miserables I was expecting the live show to be entertaining but certainly not better than the film. I could not comprehend that a staged performance could outdo a perfectly edited and enhanced film production.

I was happily proven wrong.

Because it’s Punday

The humble essay, derived from the French verb Essayer, meaning to try. As highlighted in Paul Graham’s The Age of the Essay, the aim of any essay should be to ‘try and find the answer’.

This definition, along with many other aspects of the much loved ‘modern’ essay, has been lost in today’s schooling system. Instead of searching for answers in our essays, we are simply imitating “English professors, who are imitating classical scholars, who are merely the inheritors of a tradition growing out of what was, 700 years ago, fascinating and urgently needed work.” Graham kindly suggests that this is simply a waste of time. (MIND BLOWN)

Graham instead suggests that an essay doesn’t begin with a statement, but with a question. In the schooling system I, and many of my fellow students, were brought up in we were taught to take a position and defend it. Instead what we must be searching for is a door that’s ajar and proceed to walk inside and explore the contents.

However, it’s true that questions aren’t enough and  an essay has to try and come up with some answers. Although we must not always succeed, best to think of these as “experiments with inconclusive results”.  These ‘inconclusive’ essays will not be published but those essays that are published should ideally tell the reader something he didn’t already know.

It was heartwarming to know that Graham also shares my frustrating habit of meandering his way through essays. When he explained that this was a good thing, I practically jumped for joy. He explains that an essay is supposed to be a search for truth and any essay that didn’t twist and turn, meandering through the information, would simply be suspicious.