About Joel

Early Life

Joel was born in 1987 in a small village in South Yorkshire that has since been dismantled and moved to Lincolnshire following a council dispute over bin collection routes. His mother has confirmed that he was a difficult baby, and his father has confirmed that his mother was also quite difficult, so the overall picture is one of shared responsibility.

He learned to read at the age of three, which was impressive until it became clear he was only reading the backs of shampoo bottles and the terms and conditions for a Hoover warranty. By age seven he had read every cereal box in the house, some of them twice, and had formed strong opinions about the legal jurisdiction governing promotional tie-ins with theme parks he would never visit.

His primary school report card noted that Joel "shows great promise but continues to insist on referring to the class hamster by its full name, which he has given it, which is Gregory." Gregory the hamster went on to live a full and happy life, which is more than can be said for most class hamsters, and Joel has never let anyone forget it.

Education

Joel attended the University of Sheffield, where he studied English Literature because someone told him it would be useful and he believed them. He graduated with a 2:1, which he has since described as "basically a first if you round up," a position that the University of Sheffield does not endorse but has also not explicitly denied in writing, which Joel considers a win.

His dissertation was a 12,000-word analysis of the comedic timing of supermarket self-checkout machines, arguing that their persistent inability to identify unexpected items in the bagging area constituted a form of avant-garde performance art. It was given a 68, which his supervisor described as "generous, given the subject matter," and which Joel described as "a clear sign the academic establishment wasn't ready."

During his time at university, Joel was also the president of the Debating Society, the treasurer of the Cheese Appreciation Society, and the sole member of the Society for the Appreciation of Societies, which he founded, funded, and shut down within the same academic term after determining that the meta was getting out of hand.

Career

After graduating, Joel briefly considered a career in law, then in medicine, then in architecture, then in veterinary science, then in marine biology, then in lighthouse keeping, then once more in law, before ultimately deciding on "whatever this is." He has described this period as "finding himself," and his bank account has described it as "concerning."

He spent three years working at a digital agency in Leeds where his primary responsibilities included writing copy for websites, attending meetings that could have been emails, and maintaining a detailed spreadsheet tracking the office's collective biscuit consumption, which he presented to management as a "wellness initiative" but which was in fact a personal vendetta against a colleague who kept taking the last Chocolate Digestive without replacing the packet.

In 2019, Joel became freelance, a decision he made on a Tuesday and reconsidered every Wednesday for the following eighteen months. He has since worked with clients across a range of industries, all of whom have described him as "punctual," "competent," and "oddly specific about font choices," which he takes as the highest compliment anyone has ever paid him, because it was.

Among his freelance clients was a law firm in Woking, who engaged him to write website copy and with whom he parted ways after submitting a tagline that their managing partner described as "legally inadvisable." He stands by it. They said it sounded like a threat. He said it sounded like a promise. They said thank you, we'll be in touch. They were not in touch.

The Incident

In March 2023, Joel was involved in what authorities have since described as "not technically an incident, but we understand why he keeps calling it that." While walking home from the shop, he witnessed a swan standing in the middle of a roundabout. He called the council. The council said it was a matter for the RSPCA. The RSPCA said it was a matter for the police. The police said it was a matter for the council. The swan, by this point, had left of its own accord. Joel has cited this as the moment he realised that no institution in this country is capable of dealing with a swan on a roundabout, and that if anything was going to get done properly, he would have to do it himself. joel2.com is the result.

Personal Life

Joel currently lives somewhere in the north of England, the exact location of which he prefers not to disclose, not because he is hiding, but because the last time he told someone where he lived they showed up and asked to use his WiFi. He enjoys walking, which he calls "hiking" to make it sound more impressive, and cooking, which he calls "cooking" because there is no way to make it sound more impressive than it already is when you consider that he once made a risotto that caused a neighbour to knock on the door and ask what the smell was in a way that could have been positive but was not.

He does not have a dog, but he has opinions about dogs, and he would like you to know them. He does not have a cat, and the feeling appears to be mutual. He once tried to keep a houseplant alive for eleven months, which he considers his greatest achievement, and which his mother, who once kept a cactus alive for thirty-seven years, considers "a start."

In 2024, Joel applied to host a wildebeest through a government urban wildlife relocation scheme. His application was rejected on two grounds: first, that his garden was not of sufficient size for an animal of that stature, which was reasonable, and second, that he had described the garden as "spiritually adequate for a medium-to-large ungulate" in the relevant field, which the caseworker flagged as "not an answer to the question." He has since replanted the garden. He would like to stress that this was not because of the wildebeest. The timing is coincidental. He has not re-applied.

Awards & Recognition

• 2014 — Voted "Most Likely to Write a Website About Bears" by people who had no reason to believe this would happen, and yet here we are
• 2017 — Recipient of the "Actually, Technically" Award from the Sheffield University Debating Society, given to the member who most frequently responded to arguments with the phrase "actually, technically" before making a point that was technically correct but contributed nothing to the discourse
• 2019 — Shortlisted for a thing he is not at liberty to discuss, for reasons he is also not at liberty to discuss, but he would like you to know that the shortlisting occurred and that it was "a big deal"
• 2021 — Recognised by his local council for "consistent and timely payment of council tax," an award that does not exist but which Joel feels he has earned through sheer consistency
• 2024 — Named a "Person of Interest" by absolutely nobody in any official capacity, though a woman at the post office did once say "you again" to him in a tone that suggested some level of sustained interest

Contact

Joel does not accept unsolicited correspondence. He had a contact form once. It was operational for nine days, during which it received four messages: three were from someone asking if he was "the Joel who owed them money" (he was not, but the specificity was unsettling), and one was a photograph of a swan with no accompanying text, which he considered more threatening than the money question. The form was removed. He does not intend to replace it.

If you need to reach Joel, he is sometimes visible through the window of a specific post office on a specific day of the week, and he would prefer that you not find out which one.