As much as we know about the world around us, we can't know everything. This is especially true when we think about a field or profession we're not directly involved in or with,
The film industry is a good example. Unless we're directly involved, we really know nothing about what it's like to make movies. How much of that computer hacking scene is based in reality? Is that a real disease? Did the actor do that entire stunt himself, or was there a stunt double helping?
Reddit is full of professionals who know the secrets of their industries and are ready to share.
It all started when Redditor pocketcrackers asked:
"What fact is common knowledge in your field, but almost unknown to the rest of the population?"
Let's Get Out Of Here!
"People almost always try to exit through the same door they entered. In a crowded venue ALWAYS take a second to find your exit and then find a second exit. Mark them in your brain just in case. In an emergency most of the crowd is going to go for the main door they came in through. Knowing where another exit is can save your life."
– Spiritual_Worth
Be Aware Of Symptoms
"UTIs will often cause confusion in people over 70."
– silly-billy-goat
"I work in the mental health field. Often I’m told a loved one has dementia, Alzheimer’s, etc. I will ask about symptom onset and they’ll say “a couple days” or something similar. A round of antibiotics later and the loved one is usually back to their baseline. UTIs in older folks are wild."
– ChicagoOwls
Stronger Than You Think
"When you're taking Imodium you're actually taking an opioid. But it's designed to only interact with the opioid receptors in your digestive tract to slow down your intestines. Scientists were like hey. You know that anti-diarrhea medication heroin? Well what if we made a version of that without the pesky side effects of getting you high?"
– NotMyDogPaul
Come On, Stand
"Your calf muscles act as a pump for your lymph fluid, which is basically the garbage pick-up and immunity doordash of your body. Without flexing your calf, the fluid has no way of moving against gravity. Each time we walk, the muscles contract, squeezing the fluid back up towards the core for processing.That's why sitting for long periods causes swelling in the legs."
– Orange-Enough
If We Could Only Speed Up...
"Trucker here and we don't want to be anywhere near you either."
"Go around or stay back don't just ride right beside us. We can't see you very well when you are beside us and if sh*t happens you're gonna go splat."
"It is very very very rare that any driver wants to slow you down it's not like we get our rocks off on making you late. We work extremely long hours on very little sleep and we just wanna get where we are going without getting in an accident and killing someone."
"Trust me if we could go faster we damn sure would."
"Also if you give us the fist pump to honk our horn you just made our whole week. That's one of the greatest joys in a truckers life."
"Be safe out there!!"
– MissPatricia024
Not Your Fault
"Bed bugs don’t make you a nasty person with a nasty home. An infestation isn’t due to a sanitation issue. They’re an imported pest, which means they hitched a ride on something you brought into the house. Usually luggage or furniture."
– LosPetty1992
Real Or Not Real
"In any given nature documentary, the protagonist animal you’re rooting for is ‘played’ by several different ‘actors’ - i.e. that one brown bear’s story is patched together from footage of a bunch of different bears. And in about 90% of the ‘animal reacting’ shots they’re reacting to the camera crew. Nature documentaries are heavily constructed."
– BootsyRootsy
"Also all those amazing closeups of bugs and small critters burrowing and stuff are done on a set in a studio."
"Honestly, when you learn about all the work that goes into creating such a documentary, it's even more impressive."
– donkeyhawt
"I refuse to believe that one iguana running from all those snakes was multiple iguanas. Little man (woman?) ran its little heart out and earned its place in this world!"
– nozer12168
Gathering Info
"The point of most loyalty programs isn't to give you points so you'll shop more (though that isn't a bad thing) it's to gather data (i.e. where do you shop, how often, how much do you buy there, what sort of things at what price points, etc etc.). For us marketing types, data is king (even small things like if a cashier asks for your zip code)."
–inostranetsember
Grey's Anatomy Lied
"When a person “flat lines” you cannot shock them out of it."
– unassumingtoaster
"Chest compressions!! Chest compressions!! Chest compressions!!"
"- Dr. Mike"
– thedanishgirl02
The Movies Also Lied
"Movie hacking: "I've decrypted the firewall and begun a brute force method on the internal systems, but they have a quantum lock on the googleplex, I'll be sure to upload a dinglehopper and slay the Jabberwocky.""
"Real hacking: "I called a random employee and pretended to be IT, they gave me admin privileges in 5 minutes.""
– wererat2000
Ick.
"When I worked as a barista: how much f**king syrup is in flavored drinks. At the cafe I worked at, we measured flavoring by grams. If you got a large mocha, that motherf**ker would have like 110 grams of chocolate sauce in it."
"If you want a little bit of flavor, I suggest only 1 pump. 2 max."
– miss_queeferson
Verify, Don't Trust
"Historian here: everything you read, regardless of source, has the biases of whoever wrote it woven throughout. I will tell a much different account of a Roman Battle if I am a Roman citizen than if I am a Gaul. Same goes for modern times, I will tell a much different account of an event as a liberal woman than if I was a conservative man. That's why checking and vetting sources is our biggest advice, remember the context that the author is writing from when you're reading!"
– Chutzpah3
"The world runs on MS Excel."
– Boulavogue
How very true!
Do you have any tea to spill? Let us know in the comment below.