If I want to live my life like an average person and be an average person, what would that look like? Would you want to live like an average person? According to wikipedia, "Overall the average American, age 25 or older, made roughly $32,000 per year, does not have a college degree, has been, is, or will be married as well as divorced at least once during his or her lifetime, lives in his or her own home in a suburban setting, and holds a white-collar office job", as of 2005.
What defines average and how do you define it? What about things people don't often associate with measurements? How many books should you read to be average? How much Star Trek can you like without being a "trekky fan"? How obsessive can you be with buying shoes and still be normal? How many pairs of underwear should you have? How clean should your house be? How many hours can you spend obsessing over your car or your lawn? Where is the point where something is done at a normal rate versus an obsessive rate -- stock watching, sports watching, tv watching, celebrity watching, listening to music. How long do you spend on the phone per day and still tell your husband you're not using it as much as he thinks you are?
A foray into the lives of an average person (about 50% of the population) brings about this data:
- According to an internet site that I don't highly value, so I won't mention, based on a survey of about 1,000 American adults about 30% did not read a book in the last year; 25% read less than 5 books; 15% read 6 to 10 books and a little less than a third of you read too much.
- If you devote all your free time to Star Trek, you're a trekkie; if you squeeze in some other interests with your Star Trek devotion, you're a trekker; if you only catch the reruns on television, you're just an average nobody; if you have to debate whether Star Trek or Star Wars is more popular, put on your costume and watch and compare alone.
- According to various internet sources, the average woman owns 19 pairs of shoes, twice as many as her male counterpart. Yet, she only puts between five to seven in use; the rest are too uncomfortable.
- How many pairs of underwear does the average person own? This one depends on your fetish. A sampling of answers ranged from 20 to 50.
- An average woman cries 5.3 times per month while a man cries 1.4 times per month. Does crying over a losing sports team count as crying?
- An average person farts about 14 to 16 times a day or releases about half a liter of gas. Those numbers sound too high that I have to throw it in there, because I cannot ever remember releasing that much gas in a day.
- Throughout their working career, a person will change jobs about 11 times. If you've surpassed that number, it's time to sit down and ask some serious questions like the meaning of life and why you're here. Maybe your true passion is being a trekkie.
- The average smartphone user spends about an hour a day on her phone.
On average, you will watch 2.8 hours of tv a day. This number is from the BLS, so their number has to be wrong. Who has that kind of time anyway? - Most people spend less than 4 hours a day listening to music. Some people listen to music all day while working, so that will skew the results.
- How often does an average person clean the house? I'm not answering this one, because I think you should clean every day regardless of what the answer says.
Search the data yourself if you want to validate the sources. I would make them up but it takes too much brain power to make sure the math works out and there are no flaws in the fabrication. It's easier to do an internet search for answers; if more than one source says the same thing, than it's probably 50% accurate. Some self-defecating information, I'm not an average person in most of those categories. And what would you call someone who isn't average? Abnormal? Unique? Eccentric? Nerdy? Who cares right? That's what I'm saying. I like you already.
