After reading Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut, I was inspired to craft a few chips of ICE-9 as a sort of prop. I intended to go forward with a collection of doomsday items – including red matter from Star Trek – but then decided to expand the collection to include impossible things.
I have this on display in my office, with each item neatly labeled with a name and a warning. It’s pretty geeky, but so is noting when my car’s odometer turns into a binary number.
Also in my office – at least sometimes – is a plastic figure of Spongebob Squarepants. The other half of the time, he’s in my colleague’s office. We take turns hiding the SbSp and the game goes back in forth. Except for this most recent time. I had found SbSp in my cubicle and hid him in my colleague’s office. He found him, and had him out on his desk. I was going past his office, realized he wasn’t in and saw SbSp – and hide him again in a new location. I think I’ve taken the game to a new level. 🙂
I had intended on getting my license and registration updated on Thursday after work – and wore a nice shirt and tie to the office that day. Now, I always try to look reasonable at work, but I rarely wear a tie. And it was remarkable enough that several of my co-workers asked what was going on. As I was headed out for the day, I noted on the forms I had with me that the BMV doesn’t take credit cards in person. Since I didn’t have my checkbook, I decided to defer it for another day. A day that, I’m sure, will be filled with people asking me again what the occasion is.
I had a dentist appointment on Friday and got to their office a little early. I signed in and they took me right back. The hygienist remembered me – and my origami – from last time I was in there and was again amazed at how much I was able to fold without looking. I couldn’t really look at what I was doing since she had both hands and what I’m guessing was a belt sander in my mouth. At one point she poked my lip with a sharp object – enough to make me wince. She apologized and I gave her what I’d folded – so, we’re still friends.
And now for the not-so-fun item. I hurt my hand on Friday evening. I was in the middle of a reasonable discussion turned into argument and lost my cool. Which was disappointing because I’d been doing really really well at keeping my cool up to that point. I slammed my fist down on the counter to:
1. Make a loud noise.
2. Get the other person’s attention
3. Prove a point – or something, I’m still not entirely clear on what I thought I was accomplishing.
I did make a loud noise and got their attention, but I also hurt my hand. It started to ache, swell up a bit, and I found out a few minutes later that it was bleeding a bit. I left the discussion/argument with a very nicely worded parting shot, and headed out to get something to eat. I fully intended to make it a short trip, but I wasn’t paying attention and got on the highway as though I was headed into work. Which is apparently my default destination and pretty sad all by itself – but instead of checking in at the computer center, I went to McDonald’s for some chicken nuggets. I amazed the cashier with my PayWave card when I paid for my meal – she must have been new – and ate my meal with my left hand. The food was hot and tasted good and one of the employees did a passable job of singing along with the music over the speakers while she refilled the napkin dispensers. I started to get my wits back about me and was able to take stock.
I know I’ve got a temper that I try and keep under control, mainly because I know the futility of lashing out at – or arguing with – the irrational. I guess what set me over the edge was that I was so close to actually winning the argument. Which is sort of a crazy notion all by itself – no one actually wins an argument. If things get to the point where there’s an argument, then everyone has already lost. But I almost won this one – and if getting the last word counts for anything, I at least scored more points.
I went to Border’s after dinner and carefully worked at putting my keys and wallet in my left pockets. I’m still favoring my hand a bit, but the swelling has gone down and I’ll be back to 100% soon enough. On the plus side, I’m surprised at the amount of force I was able to generate. I didn’t damage the counter, but nearly breaking one’s own hand is almost cool. Well, not really.
One of the books I got was a sort of self-help book. Which I don’t normally take much stock in, but it was relevant to what was going on in my head and it’s helped a little.
In addition to the reading, I’ve been playing a lot of video games this weekend. I’ve been working my way through a game called Sacred 2, looking to complete the Dryad’s quest and get a super-ultra-awesome-mondo-powerful bow. Today, I completed the quest and got the bow. And it’s surprisingly not as powerful as I expected. It’s better than the one I had, but not by much. So, I think that game is going back on the shelf for a while.
I’ve got a short work week ahead of me – thankfully – and then a few days off. The holidays are approaching and I need to start figuring out what to get for people. And that also means that birthday #38 is on the horizon. Yikes!
