The oddsbreaker, tips for avoiding wrinkles, corn flakes, then a commitment
We strive for meaning.
Loneliness is the enemy and it makes us look for patterns and connections everywhere, be it Jungian synchronicity or the horoscope in the back of my cousin´s Glamour magazine last Sunday with “J-Lo” on the cover and all of a sudden I discover- en route to the 20 ways to spice up your sex life article- that sleeping on your own face (down on the pillow) makes you more prone to having wrinkles. Please bear with all the non sequitur here, we are getting somewhere (think of reading this post like being a wingman for the Red Baron if WWI had been fought in the 1960s under the influence of Timothy Leary). The horoscope said I should be a. Looking for a new job (no, not right now) and b. It´s a good time for finding a new man (no, it´s strictly a woman´s magazine and I was just flipping through because it was on the backseat of my cousin´s car and the trip would take about two hours and I didn´t feel like talking about the Oscar because all I´ve seen so far was Good Luck Good Night or something. Terrific movie, though!)
Case in point I´m a bit edgy this morning because there´s this blood test here at work and this means none of us could have breakfast so this is the sound of my blood boiling on corn flakes withdrawal:
[SFX: Exquisite GURGLING sound]
On a sidenote, they told us it´s supposed to measure our cholesterol and stuff but I really think it´s about drug detection. Or is it done by peeing in the cup? Gee I really hope I don´t have to pee inside the cup today; if there´s one thing I really hate is aiming at that really narrow opening… Oh wait. That last bit didn´t sound at all like I intended. You know.
See? We´re “BC” on the timeline here now, which stands for Before Corn flakes. I have the right to go conspiracy-theory on a blood test before breakfast.
Next part of the story is tucked in under the deceptively-safe aegis of the “small world” banter. The coincidence. Synchronicty:
Happened yesterday afternoon at the office:
[Am called up for the test and discover I have been losing an ungodly amount of weight with all the jogging and the push-ups and the barbells. Looking good!!]
Back to happened yesterday afternoon at the office, an unexpected phone call from out of the blue:
CUSTOMER, on the phone: Hi. This is [name] from [company] and ahh. May I ask you a question?
ME, Sure.
CUSTOMER: Ahhn it´s not a question about work per se, you see…
ME: No prob.
CUSTOMER: Ahh. It´s just that I was copied in a e-mail you sent to this guy who works with me and I saw your name I thought it sounded familiar, I thought, I know this guy.
ME: Yes?
CUSTOMER: Yes. By any chance… did you happen to grow up in [name of small town, my hometown] ?
ME, a little surprised: Actually yeah.
CUSTOMER: Did you live in [name of building]?
ME, very surprised: Daaamn. Yeah.
CUSTOMER: Wow, don´t you remember me? We grew up together and… etc etc etc.
Turns out the guy is living a state or three away, down south, is copied on some company e-mail, recognizes the name, wham!, too funny. It is a small world after all and stuff.
We called him [name]-the-owl because of his thick-rimmed spectacles. You´re probably thinking of Clark Kent, no, guy was more like Harry Potter.
…Then it was on to the train, then off to the locker room [reads, Shopping Center. I change clothes in the bathroom in the Shopping, the one on the 3rd floor just beneath the food court. Now this is hard-science for you people, always go for the bathroom one story beneath the food court. It´s always the cleanest and it´s seldom full.] and this one cool, cool thing happened:
I discovered I´d forgotten my shorts, how can I run without my shorts? The Flash keeps his uniform miniaturized, shrunken inside a special ring but I don´t have that advantage… so it was straight to the sportswear store and I bought brand-new shorts, actually a tad expensive (I´m a cheap bastard, by the way) Mizuno sportswear for tennis players that dry up real soon and are almost weightless, makes you feel you´re running naked and I have just realized that for the first time in years I´ve actually COMMITTED to something other than the work or comic books.
Probably busted my knees again… and shoulders.
No, scratch that. I´m sore all over. Feels good, almost happy now.
"Currently engineering a jailbreak," see? I told you.
Loneliness is the enemy and it makes us look for patterns and connections everywhere, be it Jungian synchronicity or the horoscope in the back of my cousin´s Glamour magazine last Sunday with “J-Lo” on the cover and all of a sudden I discover- en route to the 20 ways to spice up your sex life article- that sleeping on your own face (down on the pillow) makes you more prone to having wrinkles. Please bear with all the non sequitur here, we are getting somewhere (think of reading this post like being a wingman for the Red Baron if WWI had been fought in the 1960s under the influence of Timothy Leary). The horoscope said I should be a. Looking for a new job (no, not right now) and b. It´s a good time for finding a new man (no, it´s strictly a woman´s magazine and I was just flipping through because it was on the backseat of my cousin´s car and the trip would take about two hours and I didn´t feel like talking about the Oscar because all I´ve seen so far was Good Luck Good Night or something. Terrific movie, though!)
Case in point I´m a bit edgy this morning because there´s this blood test here at work and this means none of us could have breakfast so this is the sound of my blood boiling on corn flakes withdrawal:
[SFX: Exquisite GURGLING sound]
On a sidenote, they told us it´s supposed to measure our cholesterol and stuff but I really think it´s about drug detection. Or is it done by peeing in the cup? Gee I really hope I don´t have to pee inside the cup today; if there´s one thing I really hate is aiming at that really narrow opening… Oh wait. That last bit didn´t sound at all like I intended. You know.
See? We´re “BC” on the timeline here now, which stands for Before Corn flakes. I have the right to go conspiracy-theory on a blood test before breakfast.
Next part of the story is tucked in under the deceptively-safe aegis of the “small world” banter. The coincidence. Synchronicty:
Happened yesterday afternoon at the office:
[Am called up for the test and discover I have been losing an ungodly amount of weight with all the jogging and the push-ups and the barbells. Looking good!!]
Back to happened yesterday afternoon at the office, an unexpected phone call from out of the blue:
CUSTOMER, on the phone: Hi. This is [name] from [company] and ahh. May I ask you a question?
ME, Sure.
CUSTOMER: Ahhn it´s not a question about work per se, you see…
ME: No prob.
CUSTOMER: Ahh. It´s just that I was copied in a e-mail you sent to this guy who works with me and I saw your name I thought it sounded familiar, I thought, I know this guy.
ME: Yes?
CUSTOMER: Yes. By any chance… did you happen to grow up in [name of small town, my hometown] ?
ME, a little surprised: Actually yeah.
CUSTOMER: Did you live in [name of building]?
ME, very surprised: Daaamn. Yeah.
CUSTOMER: Wow, don´t you remember me? We grew up together and… etc etc etc.
Turns out the guy is living a state or three away, down south, is copied on some company e-mail, recognizes the name, wham!, too funny. It is a small world after all and stuff.
We called him [name]-the-owl because of his thick-rimmed spectacles. You´re probably thinking of Clark Kent, no, guy was more like Harry Potter.
…Then it was on to the train, then off to the locker room [reads, Shopping Center. I change clothes in the bathroom in the Shopping, the one on the 3rd floor just beneath the food court. Now this is hard-science for you people, always go for the bathroom one story beneath the food court. It´s always the cleanest and it´s seldom full.] and this one cool, cool thing happened:
I discovered I´d forgotten my shorts, how can I run without my shorts? The Flash keeps his uniform miniaturized, shrunken inside a special ring but I don´t have that advantage… so it was straight to the sportswear store and I bought brand-new shorts, actually a tad expensive (I´m a cheap bastard, by the way) Mizuno sportswear for tennis players that dry up real soon and are almost weightless, makes you feel you´re running naked and I have just realized that for the first time in years I´ve actually COMMITTED to something other than the work or comic books.
Probably busted my knees again… and shoulders.
No, scratch that. I´m sore all over. Feels good, almost happy now.
"Currently engineering a jailbreak," see? I told you.
posted by 186282mps at 8:31 AM
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