On the off chance you never noticed - I am a dork
This morning on my way into work I had just gotten to the Davis entrance to the T when a coworker of mine pulled up on his bike. We greeted each other, and he joked that we'd see whose route was faster, then took off. I called after him that of course he would win.
As I descended into the subway, I had the following thought: "Well, if it were a longer trip, it's likely I'd beat him, since the initial lag of getting a train would be less important, given the longer time. It's like latency vs. throughput..."
And y'know, that actually is a good analogy, but I did feel dorky when that was my immediate frame of reference.
On meeting back up with that coworker in the kitchen, we joked about it. He beat me by a small margin, and mentioned it was like Thoreau and his friend heading to Fitchburg. (Thoreau hiked the whole way, his friend bet that working for train fare and catching the train would be faster. In the end, it was a close thing, but Thoreau had had an enjoyable time and picked blackberries, while his friend had done a day's work.)
Then, since I'd too little sleep and had not had my coffee yet, I proceeded to have one of those "I take action without consulting my brain first" moments. I poured a cup of coffee from our urn, which almost depleted the coffee. We always have two, and the other was already up for brew, so there was a serious dearth of remaining coffee. In my vague state, though, I'd somehow decided the coffee up for brew was already brewed and that I should do the steps of pull-out-filter-take-coffee-grinds-throw-in-compost. Yeah, well, small detail, actually, is that no, the water was still happily pouring into the filter to brew.
So I yank the filter holder toward me, spraying water and weak coffee on the counter, then dumbly thrust the contraption back toward the coffee machine, missing the rails that are supposed to hold up the filter holder contraption, and looking very confused. Since I've missed the rails, I'm holding it up still, and sort of just looking guilty and stupid. And giggling. And trying to figure out if I should re-try again, and sort of discussing it with the line of people (where by "people" we mean "coffee zombies who will attack me for standing in the way") who are filtering in, waiting for sweet, sweet caffeine delivery.
After a couple failed attempts I end up just holding the damned thing up until the coffee's finished brewing. And giggling more as more people wander in, queueing for coffee and looking at me like I'm crazy. Which I suppose I am. And then I just grabbed my damned honey and cream for my coffee and darted the hell out of there.
I am not talking about the rest of today, as it was extraordinarily frustrating, and not in an even vaguely amusing way.
Life is getting sort of less crazy, though, and I think I have free time on weekends coming up later in the month. Also, I *finally* pretty much have my voice back. I was secretly worried last week that I was going to have had this comparatively minor cold, the end result of which was that I could never sing again. This just in: I may be silly.
Also, tomorrow will be a better day.
As I descended into the subway, I had the following thought: "Well, if it were a longer trip, it's likely I'd beat him, since the initial lag of getting a train would be less important, given the longer time. It's like latency vs. throughput..."
And y'know, that actually is a good analogy, but I did feel dorky when that was my immediate frame of reference.
On meeting back up with that coworker in the kitchen, we joked about it. He beat me by a small margin, and mentioned it was like Thoreau and his friend heading to Fitchburg. (Thoreau hiked the whole way, his friend bet that working for train fare and catching the train would be faster. In the end, it was a close thing, but Thoreau had had an enjoyable time and picked blackberries, while his friend had done a day's work.)
Then, since I'd too little sleep and had not had my coffee yet, I proceeded to have one of those "I take action without consulting my brain first" moments. I poured a cup of coffee from our urn, which almost depleted the coffee. We always have two, and the other was already up for brew, so there was a serious dearth of remaining coffee. In my vague state, though, I'd somehow decided the coffee up for brew was already brewed and that I should do the steps of pull-out-filter-take-coffee-grinds-throw-in-compost. Yeah, well, small detail, actually, is that no, the water was still happily pouring into the filter to brew.
So I yank the filter holder toward me, spraying water and weak coffee on the counter, then dumbly thrust the contraption back toward the coffee machine, missing the rails that are supposed to hold up the filter holder contraption, and looking very confused. Since I've missed the rails, I'm holding it up still, and sort of just looking guilty and stupid. And giggling. And trying to figure out if I should re-try again, and sort of discussing it with the line of people (where by "people" we mean "coffee zombies who will attack me for standing in the way") who are filtering in, waiting for sweet, sweet caffeine delivery.
After a couple failed attempts I end up just holding the damned thing up until the coffee's finished brewing. And giggling more as more people wander in, queueing for coffee and looking at me like I'm crazy. Which I suppose I am. And then I just grabbed my damned honey and cream for my coffee and darted the hell out of there.
I am not talking about the rest of today, as it was extraordinarily frustrating, and not in an even vaguely amusing way.
Life is getting sort of less crazy, though, and I think I have free time on weekends coming up later in the month. Also, I *finally* pretty much have my voice back. I was secretly worried last week that I was going to have had this comparatively minor cold, the end result of which was that I could never sing again. This just in: I may be silly.
Also, tomorrow will be a better day.