I am starting to think that I am living a real life version of the Truman Show where everyone around me is involved in some master plot to put me in precarious and irresolvable situations for the entertainment of the rest of humanity.
Now don’t get me wrong, I am not self centered enough to truly think the world revolves around me, but I am cognoscente enough of my daily reality to know that this kind of stuff does not happen to real people.
Case Study #1
Friday Afternoon, approximately 12:37pm.
210 Freeway East On-ramp
It had been a long, exhausting week. I had spent its entirety using every ounce of available brainpower to fix problems not of my own making and was leaving the office exactly one hour and seven minutes later than I promised myself I would.
As I pulled on to the freeway, I let out a sigh of relief thinking, “my week is over. All I have to do is fold a mountain of laundry.” But no, someone else, someone sitting up in a control booth in the sky thought, “laundry will not bring in ratings! My advertisers will not pay top dollar to watch this. How about a little fire instead.”
And fire is what I got. Literally.
As I pulled on to the freeway in my ignorant laundry folding bliss, I noticed a flatbed truck quickly making its way into my lane (this is a nice way of saying he cut me off). Now, under normal circumstances, I would have laid on my horn and let him know my distaste for his driving techniques, but the fingers of flames expediently crawling from beneath the vehicle atop his flatbed caused me to rethink that decision.
Within three seconds the truck had maneuvered its way to the side of the freeway and the flames had maneuvered their way to encompass the entirety of the vehicle atop the truck, with my cute little death trap, ahem car (full of gas, might I add) less than what your driver’s ed. instructor would consider a safe distance between two vehicles.
Oh but wait, “man in the sky” (played by Ed Harris) is greedy and thinks he can go for the Super Bowl style advertising placement on this one - what if the cab exploded into flames and the truck driver narrowly escapes said flames by jumping right in front of the heroine’s death trap. Oh, it’s an Emmy in the making.
I swerved and pulled over.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“AguyjustjumpedoutofhisflatbedtruckinfrontofmeonthefreewaywhileitwasonfireandtheflamesaregettingBIGGER.”
“I am sorry ma’am, let me transfer you to the CHP”
“Hello, CHP what is your emergency?”
“AguyjustjumpedoutofhisflatbedtruckinfrontofmeonthefreewaywhileitwasonfireandtheflamesareGETTINGREALLYBIG.”
“I am sorry ma’am, let me transfer you the fire department,”
“Fire Department, what is your emergency?”
“AguyjustjumpedoutofhisflatbedtruckinfrontofmeonthefreewaywhileitwasonfireandtheflamesaregettingBIGGERandnowthetruckisstartingtoEXPLODE.”
“We already know about this (insert dial tone here).”
Finally, flashing lights. But it’s just the paramedics, but not all the paramedics, just one, who doesn’t really do anything but sit and watch the truck continue to burst into flames.
Now, man in the sky decides “oh, let’s make this a bit more fun” and an ambulance full of three attractive paramedics, all in full firefighter uniform, visit the scene and decide that my current location on the side of the freeway is not safe (because really, sitting directly behind an ambulance is not the safest place on earth to be) and I am relocated to the front seat of the ambulance (for future reference ambulance guys, me+knobs+buttons+ambulance=accident waiting to happen).
It wasn’t long before ambulance guy number one decided placing me with all the knobs and buttons might not have been the best idea ever and sent me on my merry way.
Friday Afternoon, approximately 1:37pm.
Kitchen, Dining Room Table
Here I am folding my laundry and thinking “hey man in the sky…I want my cut.”
