You might want to write that down.

My least favorite phrase in the English language is

"You might want to write that down. "

Linguistically, it is ugly - all those hard consonants.
You might want to write that down.
It doesn't just roll of the tongue like something with a lot of R's or L's might.

But the main reason I hate this sentence is that people say it to me.

You might want to write that down.

At school, at work, people are always telling me what to write down, implying that my feeble brain can't handle the wealth of information they are about to unload on me. It is of such importance that they can't rely on me to hold the information in my head for later retrieval. I must find a pen, find a paper, and transcribe the words I hear verbatim. However, they do not tell me to write down where I have written the original information, so clearly I can be trusted to remember where I wrote it. Just not what I wrote.

This is a riduculous situation. Not ridiculous in the sense that it could never happen; more ridiculous in the sense that it does happen, and quite often.

I never write things down when people use that phrase. This is because it's only ever things that
a) I already know, and therefore will have less of a chance forgetting,
b) are completely obvious, and so there even if I did forget, I would remember instantly, or
c) I can easily figure out using my friend, Mr. Common Sense.
Thus, writing it down would only be a waste of pen, paper, and my time.

Not once have I been given highly important information following this sentence. No magical math formulas, not the unspoken word of God, no secret military codes. The one time I was given a secret military code, the General did not say

You might want to write that down.

He just said the code; I had to make a split-second decision on whether or not my brain would correctly and responsibly store the information.To be safe, I wrote it down. But I forgot to write down where I put it. Sorry for all those wars that caused, by the way.

Sometimes when I hear

You might want to write that down.

I feel like shouting back "Well you might want to kiss my ass!" but there has never been an appropriate time for that comeback. Something I learned a long time ago (but didn't write down) was not to tell authority figures to suck it, even if that is something they need to hear.

The next person that says that to me will get punched in the face. No. That's not nice. I will go for my pen, because I should write that down, and stab them in the eye.

You might want to write that down.