WotD: Second-guess

There are two ways to look at the meaning of second-guessing.

The first is to criticize someone after the fact.

What I mean is that after you have completed something, someone else tells you what you should have done or how they would have done it better.

In other words, they’re second-guessing you.

Don’t you hate it when people do that?

The second meaning is to try to predict what will happen or what someone will do.

This second-guessing can be handy when playing chess, buying a car or arguing with your wife.

Wait, come to think of it, you should never second-guess your wife.

The chances are that your wife knows you better than you know her.

If you second-guess her, she has already done the same to you and can counteract anything you can think of.

It’s why husbands always lose in an argument with their wives.

Yeah, write this down somewhere, unless you want to become your own worst enemy, never second-guess your wife.

Now that I’ve got that little tidbit of advice out of the way, we can get back to our word of the day.

In North America, the first meaning is more often used.

When Americans or Canadians second-guess someone, they are usually criticizing a decision that they made.

If you purchase a two-door car, someone will always say you didn’t consider having children.

They’d say that when you have kids, it’ll be much easier to put them in the back if you have four doors.

If you buy a house in the countryside, someone will say you’re too far away from the good schools and hospitals in the city.

On the other hand, if you buy in town, someone will second-guess you and say that you’ll be sorry you didn’t get a bigger house and garden in the suburbs.

No matter your decision, there’s always someone who will second-guess you.

Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test

This post is understandable by someone with at least a 7th-grade education (age 12).

On the Flesch-Kincaid reading-ease test, this post scores 78.

The easier a passage is to read, the higher the score on a scale of 0 – 100.