bad timing

Im-pick-able Timing

/ Diane Henders / 36 Comments

All my life, I’ve had issues with timing.

If there was a ‘worst possible’ time to attempt something, I would nail it.  In grade school, the other kids could whisper and pass notes all throughout class; but if I tried it even once, I got busted by the teacher instantly.

Same with clothing problems.  Anybody can have a wardrobe malfunction1, but mine occur at the worst possible moments.  (Then again, I suppose there’s no good time for a wardrobe malfunction.)

When I was running for a bus and my shoe flew off, it didn’t happen on the sidewalk.  No, the perfidious shoe launched itself off my foot while I was dashing across the middle of a busy six-lane street during rush hour.  Fortunately I didn’t get creamed by traffic or ticketed for jaywalking.  Or would that be jayrunning…?

And the one and only time my underwear elastic failed, it was while… you guessed it… I was running for a bus.  Fortunately I’d worn pants that day; so instead of dropping to my ankles and tripping me into the path of an oncoming truck, the errant undies only slithered down my hips and hung up on the crotch of my pants.  It wasn’t the most comfortable sensation in the world, but at least I didn’t get murdered by my own gitch.  (That’s yet another reason why I avoid wearing dresses.  Just think:  If I’d worn a dress that day they might still be picking my pieces out of a truck grille.  Dresses are hazardous to your health.)

Anyway…

Let’s talk about red lights.  You know those controller devices that emergency vehicles use to switch the traffic lights in their favour when they’re responding to a call?  Well, apparently I have one of those things implanted in my body… only it switches the traffic lights against me.

It’s actually a hereditary condition – my dad had the same problem.  If my stepmom was driving through the town near their place, she’d sail right through with green lights all the way; but if Dad was driving every light would turn red, every time.  I can’t drive through that town without hitting all the red lights, either.  Just when I think “This time I’m going to make it!” the light changes with impeccable timing.

This problem is so much a part of me that I rarely even think of it anymore.  I usually just accept it and move on… until this week, when it jumped up and bit me again.

I was sitting in my favourite chair enjoying the view from our upstairs window.  We live on a dead-end road out in the sticks, so vehicular traffic is sparse and pedestrians are practically nonexistent.

So I was looking out at the mountains absently rubbing my nose… when I lowered my gaze in time to spot a lone man hiking along, staring up at me at the precise moment I was apparently picking my nose.

Argh!

But it could have been worse.  At least I wasn’t having a wardrobe malfunction as well…

Anybody else plagued with timing issues?

* * *

1Here’s a commercial that didn’t get aired during this year’s Superbowl, but I wish it had:

The view that bit me in the, um… nose.

 

Alien Butt Sensors

/ Diane Henders / 40 Comments

They’re invisible, but I know they’re there.

I’m not sure how or when they were installed, but there are hidden pressure sensors under every toilet seat in the house, as well as on my office chair.  It’s the only possible explanation.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve just nicely settled myself on the throne when the phone rings.  In fact, it happens so frequently that it’s a standing (sorry, couldn’t resist) joke with one of my friends.  She calls; I’m in the bathroom.

Every.  Single.  Time.

This makes it sound as though a) I have continence problems and therefore spend a considerable amount of time ensconced in the holy of holies; or b) she phones me far too often.

Neither is true.  I won’t lower myself (sorry again) to discussing my bathroom habits here, other than to say:  normal.  And it’s rare for her to phone me more than once a week.

So I’m convinced that she somehow knows when I’m in the john.

It’s far too creepy to consider that she might actually be the culprit responsible for the butt sensors, so I prefer to believe they were installed by some advanced alien race that is capable of invisibility and possesses both the technology to broadcast telepathic signals of unlimited range, and the malevolence to torture me by broadcasting “Phone Diane” every time I shit… er, sit.

And the bastards didn’t stop with the toilet seats, either.

The sensor on my office chair is an extremely specialized model; probably some advanced prototype they’re developing exclusively for sales to telemarketers, politicians, and meddling relatives.

It doesn’t just register pressure and react the way the toilet-seat model does.  No, this one is far more diabolical.

It also taps into my brainwaves.

It doesn’t react when I’m doing something boring and tedious and I’d love to be interrupted.  Oh, hell no.  I can spend all bloody day writing computer training workbooks with nary a peep, but within ten seconds of achieving the zen-like bliss of uninterrupted writing … I’ll be interrupted.

It’s obviously programmed with a complicated algorithm that constantly sifts through the detritus of my mind, measuring my exact degree of concentration and commitment to the task at hand.  When I achieve some critical pre-determined level, the butt sensor psychically broadcasts “Interrupt Diane using any method necessary, immediately”.

Phone calls are easiest, but in a pinch they’ll induce Hubby to choose that exact moment to ask a not-very-important but time-consuming question.  Or the courier will show up with delivery that needs a signature.  A sudden loud noise and/or cry of distress from somewhere in the house is always a winner.  Or there’s the tried-and-true method of having somebody crash into my parked
half-ton and ring the doorbell to report the accident.

That may sound far-fetched, but don’t laugh – it’s happened five times.  I don’t know how anyone can fail to see a big red truck in their rear-view mirror, so the aliens must make my truck momentarily invisible, too.

I guess it could be worse.  In the big picture, interruptions are only an annoyance.  At least the aliens don’t seem interested in my body cavities.

Unless there’s something about those butt sensors that I really don’t want to know about…