How to Have Something to Write About

I was in a café the other day.

A bloke at the next table was having an argument with his mate. Not a proper, punch-up-in-the-car-park argument.

More of a grumble.

It was about biscuits.

Specifically, whether a Jaffa Cake is a biscuit or a cake.

His mate said, “It’s in the biscuit aisle, isn’t it?”

He came back with, “Yeah, but if it goes stale, it goes hard. That’s a cake.”

And they were off.

For five minutes, they argued about this. And the funny thing is, they weren’t the first.

It’s been a courtroom debate. Lawyers, judges, evidence, the lot. It mattered to McVitie’s because cakes are VAT-free, biscuits aren’t.

So, McVitie’s went all the way to court.
And won.
It’s officially a cake.

A tiny thing, really.

But if it’s worth arguing about, it’s worth writing about. Most people think writer’s block is about running out of ideas.

It isn’t.

It’s about waiting for a “big” idea. And that’s the mistake. Because the best ideas are the small ones.

The ones you overhear. The ones you notice.

If two blokes in a café think a Jaffa Cake is worth debating, chances are other people do too.

And if people care about something, it’s a good place to start.

Big ideas don’t start big. They start small and get big in the telling.

Write about the thing you noticed. Or about the conversation you overheard.

Write about the thing that made you stop and think.

The world is full of things worth writing about.

You just have to notice them.