Emojis – The animated little pictures added to our text messages or social media postings when we can’t be arsed to type the word(s) which the graphic represents.
Although a labour saving option adding colour and whimsy to an electronic communication, if the recipient isn’t very ‘street’ some of the pictures meanings can be baffling. I count myself amongst that club who don’t have a firm grasp of all emoji meanings; subsequently, on occasion I’m unsure as to what an animated message is attempting to relay.
For example, yesterday someone sent me a message with the following emoji, whose meaning completely evaded my understanding on the subject. Leaving me unsure what the individual, with whom I was engaging in text conversation, was trying to convey.
It’s obviously a message indicating emotional shock of some sort, but there were no accompanying words hinting what had alarmed this person. Consequently, my mind embarked on it’s habitual journey to seek a solution to the conundrum.
Many epiphanies returned, of which the following are examples:-
Does that emoji advise it’s recipient the sender has mislaid their slippers? Or, as their head had commenced turning blue, could it refer to the poster’s alarm at fears he/she was morphing into a smurf? Alternatively, had they just realised they’d returned from a weekly food shop and forgot to pick up Cheesestrings?
Admittedly, I’d be surprised if there were a ‘mislaid slippers’ emoji, or indeed ones for ‘morphing into a smurf’ and ‘Cheesestring forgetfulness’. However with the knowledge voids I possess about this subject, although unlikely, I couldn’t definitively rule them out as this individual’s message.
Well, I couldn’t until I asking them anyhow. A query to which they responded “Don’t be so f***ing stupid…. It’s a graphic advising it’s receiver you (the sender) are ‘Screaming in fear’!!”
I’m unsure why my fellow conversationalist were so fearful. Surely it couldn’t have been the death threat they received yesterday from my neighbour, who delivered it adorning a Jason Vorhees hockey mask, with chainsaw in hand…… Could it?!
As a result of this vagueness I finished our text conversation confused, or should I say 
Another emoji that flummoxed me on first receipt was 
An avatar sent to yours truly when I was spouting some pretentious nonsense about quantum physics to a less than intelligent acquaintance, who will remain anonymous.
Luckily for him the number of people I know who make Benny from Crossroads seem as clever as writer Stephen Fry is substantial. Consequently, by writing ‘a less than intelligent acquaintance’ above he can rest assured there’s little chance of anyone guessing his identity.
When the bespectacled face above hit my texting receipt box I was again My initial thoughts surrounding “What the hell has genial TV presenter Harry Hill got to do with quantum physics?” A former neurosurgeon, Mr Hill is clearly an erudite and intellectually capable gent. That being said, I’d wager he doesn’t possess the level of knowledge of spacetime gravitational effects to warrant his own emoji relating to the subject….. Mind you, it’s gotta be said, Harry has a striking resemblance to the speccy emoji.
Surprisingly for me, I was actually inquisitive enough to learn the bespectacled emoji’s meaning, leading to the involvement of my old buddy google. From this research, I found the message my ‘buddy’ was relaying to me after my quantum physics ramble was ‘nerd’. As I couldn’t find a ‘thick sh**e’ graphic to reply with, I was forced to counter his putdown with this 
