It’s A-level results day on 18 August, which means a lot of people who maybe once years ago sat some exam have a great deal of opinions, bons mots and tales of struggle and survival to share with… well, each other. No teens are really watching are they? Who knows?
But which one of these educational experts or university of life graduates would make the best boyfriend? Let’s see!
“Don’t worry about it. I didn’t get any A-levels and look at me now!”
Look at him now! Jeremy Clarkson sipping champagne in St Tropez and trying not to assault anybody! Richard Branson, a zillionaire who still looks like Santa left under the grill too long! Simon Cowell, still has no idea about jeans. None of them got A-levels! Not a one!
What do they all have in common? They have lots of money and live a perfectly decent lifestyle. And yet.
Hand on heart could you ever truly say you wanted to be them? Or shag them? Ending up being sewn into your dad-jeans every day with a hairstyle that a magician couldn’t fix, let alone a barber, is the best advert I can think of for retaking those A-levels over and over again until you’re in your mid-fifties.
Date rating: 2/10. 4 if you really, really like Talksport, cava and collapsing into a heap of cholesterol on your 61st birthday.
“Just follow your dreams!”
Following your dreams is actually harder than it looks, because some people dream about being an astronaut or being able to walk through walls. Following your dreams does take hard work, yes, and usually, I’m afraid, rather a lot of self-confidence and MONEY. Got none of that? Um, well, maybe see if there’s a Marilyn Monroe quote out there to help you along.
Men who tell you to follow your dreams have usually achieved theirs – which is great – but they’re only really happy for you to follow yours if a) it does not in some way interrupt the express ride to their own achievements and b) you are funding this yourself. Oh, and c) they don’t have to talk to you about them.
Date rating: 6/10. Think of all the fridge magnets he’ll buy you at Christmas.
“Let me tell you about my victory over adversity.”
You think you’ve had it hard? He’s had it harder, you know. There may well be some Venn diagram overlap with the “Follow your dreams” guy, but this one will have tales of grit and hardship.
There are some odds to be overcome, a struggle to be had and – because every boring story told down the pub needs a hero – a huge, exaggerated victory.
Yet he makes it sound so easy! That’s because he has left out the four years he spent working at CarpetRight, crying in the stockroom.
Date rating: 5/10. Hours of fun to be had saying “Axminster” at random intervals.
“It’s not the end of the world.”
Says the media darling tweeting only to the clique he’s worked with, or met networking, or wants to meet, or might find useful, or screwed, or wants to screw, or wants to write for, or wants to write for him, or… you get the general idea.
Failing A-levels is not the end of the world to him because he is 34 and editing out double-spacing or hyphens that think they’re en-dashes in agency copy. Now that is the end of the world.
Date rating: 3/10. That should read a 4, but he hasn’t spotted the typo.
“I just, you know, got my A-levels, went to uni, got on with it and that’s it, really.”
What? No humblebrag? No Hollywood ending? This can’t be happening.
People who ‘just get on with it’ are myths – the unicorns of social media. If you find one, hang on for dear life.
Date rating: 7/10. Perhaps you could ‘adapt’ their story into something more exciting when you’ve finished tweeting your own. It’s what your followers would have wanted.
“I can’t believe I got my A-level results 17 years ago.”
Should you maybe not be thinking about something else, then? Maybe time to let go. Men who are amazed at the concept and passage of time tend to be dull over-thinkers, endlessly pondering their own mortality and forgetting to take the rubbish out.
Date rating: 4/10. They tend to be poor sleepers, worrying for hours at a time about something they said in 1984.
“Teenagers don’t care about your advice anyway; they are not reading your feed. You are 100.”
Every kingdom needs a ruler and when it comes to Twitter’s echelons of superiority, this arch commentator thinks he’s it.
He will compose his snide, wryly amusing tweets and press “Tweet” with a maniacal flourish, like Dorothy Parker ordering another round of absinthe for the Algonquin Round Table.
The trouble with kings is that they are never fully in control. And they never look up. But if they did, they would see that the sky is not the very top after all; there is… more!
Date rating: 7/10. At least in his own small bubble, he’s top of the heap. You might enjoy the odd bask in his glory when he passes 8 retweets and texts you excitedly about it.
“Everyone moaning about people talking down to teenagers who don’t care about your advice anyway – you are the lamest of them all.”
Kings give way to emperors and here’s our Lord and Master, who has recently become the sole heir of Twitter in its entirety thanks to a few strategic deaths or social media hires. His plinth is the highest of them all (as far as he knows) and this meta-God can only shake his head in disappointment as we all fall into the same trap we do every year when A-level results come out.
“They just don’t get it,” he cries out into the wilderness, from the tallest window of the uppermost floor of his lonely palace. “They… they are just as bad. They’re worse. You’re all terrible.”
Date rating: 9/10. He’s the one. He knows it all. And if you’re lucky, his head might burst and then Twitter will all be yours.
“I am going to write a blog about things people say about A-levels on Twitter.”
No. I’m stopping now. Don’t fuck this guy.
More like this:
– What your man’s favorite Spice Girl says about him
– 21 people you should never kiss at festivals
– 25 men you should never date this summer
– 33 things your date will worry about while waiting for you to turn up
