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#155. Everyday.
Shem Opolot
January 23, 2026
Hi! Welcome to The Friday Fix! You’re reading this because you probably stumbled upon this post somewhere on the internet instead of where it should be—in your inbox. But no worries; we can fix that.
Who am I? I’m Shem Opolot, a health professional turned content creator, passionate about helping people be their best selves in life and work.
Why should you subscribe?
I have over ten years of work experience in healthcare, program management, and data analytics on two continents. So, I know a little about helping you work smarter
I comb through tonnes of self-improvement content so you don’t have to, and I distill the content into bite-sized wisdom for you
I’ll occasionally make you laugh
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Hi! I'm Shem Opolot, and this is The Friday Fix, my weekly newsletter. If you've received it, you’re either subscribed or someone forwarded it to you. If you fit into the latter (yes, I’m the kind of person who uses words like “latter”) camp and want to subscribe, then click on the shiny button below:
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HAPPY FRIDAY 🎉 Recently, Elon Musk quibbled with Michael O’Leary, the CEO of my favorite airline to follow on Twitter—Ryanair. Musk wants Ryanair to use his baby, Starlink, for their in-flight WiFi, but O’Leary said it doesn’t make financial sense for the proudly cheap airline. Musk responded by calling O’Leary an “utter idiot” and asking Twitter users if he should buy the company and replace the CEO with someone named Ryan. That was funny, not gonna lie.
Do you ever consider how the “so-muchness” of information on the internet has altered our reality? Imagine how legendary Elon Musk would be if he ascended in the 90s, and we didn’t have access to all his, well, everything. Someone you know would’ve named their kid after him. Well…someone you know still might.
LIFE.
Everyday.
On the train the other day, I gave an old lady directions, and I was so proud of myself. Do I officially know where things are in this city?
As a bonus, I also learned she’s so proud of her only son, who works for the U. S. government—yes, even in these times—and despite her age, she enjoys a good cup of hot chocolate in the mornings.
“I’ll be 75 in April,” she said. “I’ve earned the right to eat what I want.”
Her shiny skin, replete with wrinkles below her cheeks that looked like they had marshmallows under them, showed she has smiled generously in her life. She didn’t look a day over 55, and of course, I insisted she looked 45 at most.
This was the second time I’d seen her on the train, but since I didn’t have my earphones in and chance willed it, it was the first time we’d spoken.
One of my favorite things about having a daily routine and commute, besides the dread of my 6 a.m. alarm and the attendant exasperation, is the gratitude for the job I prayed for that follows.
But also, the beauty of routines is all the other routines outside your own that make themselves known.
I notice the neighbor wheel his two trash bins—blue and green for recycling and regular waste respectively—onto their designated spot in front of his house. At which moment, pressed for time, always, I remember I should do the same, but often, I pray my housemate remembers. He does. We call it a working-from-home tax in the house.
I notice the parking attendant who greets everyone walking by enthusiastically, probably because he’s a nice guy, but also probably because he’s cold and needs to find joy in the job he prayed for. He’s always dressed in all black anti-cold uniform. Upon the dark background of square mouth of the parking garage, it looks like he’s being swallowed by a large leather couch, with only bits of his nose, mouth and the square rims of his eyeglasses visible. He paces back and forth, rubbing his hands together like he’s trying to make a fire, blowing air—which looks like a car’s exhaust fumes in the cold—into them intermittently. Pumping his fist in the air and nodding at me in what I hope is recognition—because we like totally have a thing now—he says, “Top of the morning to you, brother!”
I respond with a nod and eye contact, unable to use my hands because it’s cold. He has no idea, whether through duty or demeanor or dispensation, how much he does for my day.
At the train station I notice the tough coats of people I’m accustomed to seeing. I wonder if they notice me, too. I wonder if they notice me noticing them. I know the answer is probably no, because people don’t think about you or notice you nearly as much as you think.
Anyway.
Their big coats—matte, bubbly and puffy, swishy and shiny, or woolen and brushed, depending on price—are worn like military armor at the frontlines of the cold outdoors.
The train signs blink, flashing times and routes, reminding you you’re going to work. There are delays. There are always delays.
So I soak up more details in the meantime: a wayward singular white feather freed from a cheap coat, dancing in the air like a dandelion; a rat on the rails; a malfunctioning flickering light; a bald man the same height and build as me behind me. I’ve seen him before, too. Tomorrow I’ll return the favor and stand behind him. He and I also have a thing.
I don’t wear earphones on my commute most days. I used to think, like earphones in the gym, they were indispensable. In both cases, I realized how much I was missing when I forgot them.
But I also love music, so some days I plug my earphones in and time travel wherever the music takes me. But other days, I plug myself into the city. You should try it. You might learn your neighbor’s name, or better, you won’t wake up one day and wonder where everyone and everything went when you weren’t looking.
THINGS.
A quote.
Pride makes promises the soul can’t keep.
A picture.
The kids have adapted to the snow now. They beg to be taken out once they see the flurries falling from the sky.
WORK.
SUBTOTAL domination
You have data:
You want to add up the revenue, so you use the SUM function, right?
Well, sort of. You can do this:
Regular degular SUM function usage
But what if you want to filter, say, the categories, but still want to get the requisite total for the new filtered data? The SUM function can’t help you here:
Enter -- SUBTOTAL:
Looks similar, until we try to filter again:
Look at that beauty!
The SUBTOTAL function can perform several aggregations (up to 11, including sums and averages), making it quite powerful. To use the function, the most important thing to know is the first argument of the formula:
=SUBTOTAL(function_code, range1, [range2, …])
The function_code refers to the specific operation you want to perform (sum, average, count, etc). These have pre-assigned codes in Google Sheets, and sum is 9.
Take my course to or forever hold your mediocrity peace.
FUN.
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Have a great weekend,
— Shem
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