I lived like a true millennial for a day and it sucked

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I lived like a true millennial for a day and it sucked

It’s exhausting tbh

Nobody wanted to be born a millennial. None of us wanted to be born into a housing crisis and crippling student debt but we few, we miserable few, we band of Pokemon Go-ers, managed it. Generally defined as everyone aged 18-35, millennials have been getting bad press recently. Whether it’s articles about why we hate ourselves or ‘scientific research’ about how we can’t handshake for shit, stereotypes surrounding us are vast and generally stupid.

But do any of us actually live by the stereotypes outlined in the out of touch, confused media? Is it even possible to fulfil the expectations of the middle-aged  Daily Mail readers have of us? I decided to find out in a quest for millennials and journalists everywhere (I’ll just sit back and wait for my Nobel peace prize here) So I lived like a true millennial for a day and documented every part of it. I know, you’re welcome.

It only seemed right to start on a day that I wasn’t working so Sunday had to do. Waking up at 9am, I went back to bed because according to Google and numerous Daily Mail articles, millennials are inherently lazy. So I slept till 11.30. So far, I’m loving this.

But having missed breakfast, by 12 I’m starving so I make avocado on toast and blend some green shit in a Nutribullet while signing up for Twitter. I got the tip for a nutritious breakfast from a comment on a recent Daily Mail article: ‘VOTE UKIP LEAVE EU’ has pointed out that this is the 21st century and this is all we young people live on. So, as a millennial, I need to be using expensive blenders while narcissistically telling an app what I’m doing with my day. So thanks, ‘VOTE UKIP LEAVE EU’. Thanks for the input.

As it’s lunchtime I think it’s probably time for some yoga so I head to the garden to be properly immersed in nature and feel zen- whatever that means. It’s a nice idea in theory but yoga is harder than it looks, from the Instagram posts being barefoot seemed mandatory, but there are stones everywhere and a wasp dangerously close to me so I give up- a characteristic that Daily Mail commenter ‘Tangerine Dream’ says is typical of millennials- and go watch Netflix instead. 

I start streaming ‘Girls’ but quickly become distracted. I start to wonder how anyone can afford to live after graduating so I google earning potential from the university I go to, the amount of debt I’ll be in after graduating and look at rent prices for London. This seems to be a major concern for millennials, but looking at it all is suddenly giving me anxiety. I start having a small breakdown which wasn’t initially planned for the day but is, according to Forbes, typical of millennials so it worked out quite nicely really.

To calm myself down and take my mind of my own mortality, I turn to a quintessentially millennial past-time: adult colouring. It’s just as simultaneously pretentious and amazing as it sounds. I don’t have a colouring book because they average at around £15 on Amazon and that will cover approximately 13 minutes of rent when I  inevitably try and fail to live as a graduate in London and, you know, every little helps. So I improvise and use a notepad instead.

By 5pm, I realise I’m starving so go to make dinner which is obviously vegan and has more avocado in it than your standard Tesco Metro. Supposedly, millennials prefer food to sex. At least that’s what a new study which found that 35 per cent of us think “eating can be just as pleasurable as sex” says. So it’s important to get it right. I have a good think, and it’s at this point that I realise I haven’t told Twitter I’m vegan so I tweet about it and wait for the praise I’ll almost certainly get.

After dinner, I walk the 0.7km needed for me to hatch Pikachu on Pokemon Go and I feel the kind of genuine accomplishment that I imagine you can only get elsewhere from watching your children graduate or waking up hungover to see that your drunken past self already filled up a water bottle for you.

Unfortunately, my mum doesn’t seem as impressed so I turn to Twitter for my much-needed validation. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t arrive and I get distracted by the news that’s on in the background that just seems to be Theresa May’s face. I worry about the future of the country for a couple of minutes before starting a never-ending series  of BuzzFeed quizzes starting with ‘How much of a millennial are you?’ (91 per cent in case you were wondering) and ending with ‘Which cult should you join?’.

It’s 7pm by now and I don’t feel like I’ve been sufficiently lazy to fully live up to the millennial stereotype so I throw on pyjamas and have a nap.

I wake up half an hour later confused and disorientated and am forced to Google any stereotypes I’ve missed out.

Thankfully I don’t have to look too far. I soon discover that the Daily Mail we can’t handshake for shit so I give it a go with my weak, manual labour deprived arms and forget how to naturally handshake so I Google it and read a helpful Tab guide and it all comes flooding back.

I’m still hungry, but in typical millennial style, I can’t be bothered going to the shops myself. The obvious answer is Uber or Deliveroo, but thanks to living in Britain’s equivalent of Mordor, neither are available. Instead I call a friend and get her to drive to Sainsburys and bring me snacks under the lure of Game of Thrones.

As she’s on her way, I read another Daily Mail article about how millennials hate other millennials so, when she arrives, we sit in silence and indirectly tweet about each other hogging the dipping sauce while watching the Red Wedding episode which I suddenly have more of an appreciation for.

She leaves around 11pm and I end the day in the most millennial way possible- listening to the latest Lena Dunham podcast which is about all of her friends whom I can only assume she hates vehemently. It’s been an exhausting day, honestly.