22 June 2001
Okay, I'm torn here between telling you about how much I hate those smiley, bubbly, perky women who have that aura of "I'm cute and I know it. All I have to do is smile and bat my eyelids and you'll do as I say". But because in the latest instance I encountered this she smiled, batted her eyelids and I did exactly what she said... which was move out of her way and let her go before me in the queue, rather than have some witty, biting, scathing comment that would have had her redefining her position in the world and doubting her cuteness... here's option two, a funny story.
I never got sports as a kid. And by that I mean I never understood it not that I was never forced against my will to do it. I was the kind of kid who would be told to run to the finish line, get there and turn and say "And now?". Egg and Spoon races would leave me wondering why the egg couldn't just go in my pocket. Swimming was a case of "Will I ever need to swim faster than everyone else? No. Can I swim long enough to avoid drowning in a pool? Yes."
So, as a child, I wasn't very competitive, physically. However somehow, at an outdoor barbeque garden party thing my family was invited to, I found myself at the head of a team of tug-o-war. The property was so big that a stream ran through their back garden and this was the chosen site for the tug-o-war. I swear it was a case of everyone else took two steps back leaving me the closest to the water.
We all start heaving and pulling on the rope and it turns out I'm on the weaker team and lo and behold, I end up in the stream. Ha ha. Everybody laugh, yes, look at D. Soaking wet because his team was crap. Ha, ha.
So I head off up the hill which is still part of their property, away from laughing kids and that pitying look in my mother's eyes when she knew exactly what would happen but wanted me to find out for myself. I get to the top of the hill and there's a good breeze drying my soaked clothes off and I flap about a bit like a scarecrow in the wind beside the barbed-wire fence before looking off into the distance... from up here you can see quite far... you almost want to...
I get called back down to the gathering of parents and kids all doing their own things, stuffing their faces and gossiping and drip on the patio for a while before my mother asks what I was doing up there.
"I was going to climb the fence and go for a walk to dry off." drip, drip.
Then the host chimes in;
"Probably not a good idea. That's an electric fence."
Even worse idea:
Several years ago, I ran across a couple bored co-workers who were passing the time by seeing who could hold onto a paper clip jammed into a wall socket longer. Each of them would take turns sticking a metal paper clip into an electrical outlet, and the other would time him. The goal was to hold onto it for the longest time without passing out or getting seriously injured. I asked them if they'd like me to get a bucket of water for them to stand in while they were competing. The response? "What are you trying to do?!? Kill us?!?"
... the online home and (not very) alter(ed)-ego of Ann McMeekin, a recently freelance Web Accessibility Consultant.
... passionate about many things, most of which will turn up on this site at some time or other.
... contactable via email.
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