Personal Challenge: The Results

For those of you who have been holding your collective breath, wait no more - the results of my personal challenge are in. To refresh your memory, the challenge as set forth in my previous blog was as follows:

So, after some thought I decided that today's challenge will be to make someone I don't know laugh - not smirk or smile, but actually laugh.

I attempted this challenge a couple of times and had some success.

1) Late Thursday night shopping at the local supermarket, I was the second in line at the checkout. In front of me was a family of French immigrants, one of which was wearing a Navy uniform with a number of very important looking stripes on the sleeve. Not only were these customers taking their time loading their purchases onto the conveyor-belt, but they also spent an inordinate amount of time packaging them after the checkout lady had scanned them. To top it all off, the conveyor-belt stopped working. The checkout lady was not a happy camper. This was a perfect opportunity for my challenge. It was going to be a tough one, but the harder the challenge, the greater the success - right?

So, there I was, working hard to get all my stuff onto the stationary conveyor-belt and packed into bags at the other end. When all was done, the checkout lady rang up my total and told me what it was. I looked at the number and then said with a smirk on my face, "What? I have to pay for it, too?" She smiled a weak smile. This was going to be a tough customer, but I was building it up, you see. Then, she swiped my credit card through the card-reader and nothing happened. So she tried again. Holding the card between her two fingers she said, "Doesn't work". So I replied, "I've used it so much today, perhaps it's tired". This time a broader smile, but not what I was looking for. So I asked her to try again. It worked and then I said, "Now that you got my card working, perhaps you can fix the conveyor-belt, too?!" BANG! She laughed. I couldn't believe it. The lady laughed. OK, it was more like a giggle, but I think that fits into the criteria.

2) Later on Thursday night, I had just finished unloading the shopping from the taxi onto the footpath outside our building, which is not far from the rubbish bins. The taxi drove off and I saw a neighbour walk up to the rubbish bins, rubbish bag in hand. I have to say that although I have seen this person a number of times, I can't recall actually ever having spoken to him, so I am going to include this man as "someone I don't know".

Anyway, I looked at him, looked at my shopping then looked at him again and said, "That's the last stage" Understandably, he looked puzzled. So I said, "Well," pointing to my shopping, "this is the first stage. Eating it is the second stage," I said pointing to the house, "and throwing it away is the third stage". The man thought this was a little bit amusing (you had to be there) and so I went in for the kill, "It's the cycle of life!" BOOM! He laughed. What more could I ask for?

So I suppose you could call it a successfully completed challenge. I now have room on my schedule for more challenges. Come on, lay-em on me!

Personal Challenge

In the movie "Cheaper by the Dozen", the father Frank Gilbreth (played by Clifton Webb) is an efficiency expert. He is constantly challenging himself to improve efficiency in everything he does. "Ah!" he exclaims, "I knew it was quicker to button your shirt bottom to top!"

There was once a television program where two of the characters used to often challenge each other to do silly things. For example, they were once in a supermarket and one turned to the other and said, "For $5 I challenge you to ask the person over there where the lettuce is. But you can't say 'lettuce', you can only say 'lett-yuse'" And, of course, his friend took up the challenge. Predictably, the poor victim didn't understand what 'lett-yuse' was and started to get all aggrivated and upset, providing the sort of comic relief one would expect from a "wannabe-intellectual yuppie drama-comedy" show. But, although I haven't yet made my point, I digress.

Challenges: Sometimes I provide myself with challenges - small ones, like: 'let's see if I can get to the door before it closes', or 'let's see if I can time my walk across this room so that I meet the person walking in the opposite direction at a particular point'. Silly, I know, but these sometimes things make life a little more interesting. Actually, the Guiness Book of Records is full of people who "try to make their lives a little more interesting" - like the guy who challenged himself to visit all 275 tube stations in London in under 19 hours (result: 18 hours, 35 minutes and 43 seconds).

I was thinking that perhaps it is time that I challenge myself to something a little more worthwhile. But the challenge has to be achievable in one day - a short-term goal. But it has to be difficult enough to actually be a challenge. And it has to be more meaningful than trying to tie my shoelaces in record time (BTW: single knot, both shoes, 28.3 seconds).

As you may know from a previous blog, I was thinking of trying to see what would happen if I didn't sleep for 3 days. I have decided that, being a potentially self-destructive and masochistic activity, prolonged self-enforced sleep deprivation isn't the sort of challenge I am looking for right now. So, after some thought I decided that today's challenge will be to make someone I don't know laugh - not smirk or smile, but actually laugh. I think that this challenge will be harder than it seems, especially since this blog has made me so famous, it will be difficult for me to find someone I don't know ;-)

I'll let you know how I go on this one. If you can think of other suitable challenges, post them as comments to this blog.

UPDATE: 27 April 2006:
I have not had a chance to undertake this challenge yet. Friday is the day. I will keep you posted.

UPDATE: 30 April 2006:
I intend to post the results of this challenge shortly. See my follow-up blog called Personal Challenge: The Results

It just occured to me that another of my "personal challenges" can be found on this very blog site! See my one of my more entertaining blogs entitled: Jerry Garcia's Missing Toiliet

Watching the Watches

In the golden olden days, having a fancy fob-watch and chain draped elegantly from your waistcoat was a sign of respectability and class. Add a monocle, top-hat or classy bowler and nobody could mistake your status in society.

Today the fob watch has gone the way of a collector's item - something that grandpa used to wear that now gathers dust on the mantle or inside a display cabinet.

I have been paying attention to the watches that men wear nowadays and I have been trying to come up with some sort of rule by which you can tell what sort of man he is by looking at his watch. It would be very handy to be able to size someone up by asking him the time:

"Excuse me, Sir, do you have the time?"
"Yes, it's half-past four."
"I believe you are a family man with three children, working a 9-5 job in a semi-executive capacity in a medium sized company. You probably drive a late-model station wagon but most likely not a mini-van. Your wife's name is Susan."
"Well, Sue, actually. But how did you know all that?"
"Oh, you are wearing a combination analog-digital with a rectangular face."

Regrettably, such a rule does not seem apparent. I have found that one's watch says very little about the person. I'll give you an example. I met a man the other day who, by all other accounts looks like your quintessential English gentleman - pressed suit, shoes shined to a high-buff, cufflinks - the whole nine yards. He even spoke with a snobbyish British accent. Cheap black Casio digital.

Case number two: middle-aged bearded man, quite respectable looking, but certainly not your high-class type, probably an accountant, maybe a business man, medium-priced suit, books under his arm walks past me this morning: bright-yellow diver's watch with a round face almost as big as his hand. Go figure.

For those of you dying to know what type of watch I wear, it's a Q&Q analog - as plain as they come. When I bought it, the casing was gold coloured. Over time (pun) the gold paint wore off. When I went to replace the watch band, the salesman, with a somewhat quirky expression on his face, asked me if I wanted a gold or silver coloured band because at that stage only some of the paint had worn away. But the metamorphosis is now complete. The watch has completely taken on a dull silver colour. I hesitate to ask, but I wonder if that says anything about me?

What's On Your Desk

It is not surprising that when you clean up, you seem to find things you think you have lost - like the keys that you find buried in the crevices of your couch; or that postcard from a friend that released itself quietly from the magnet and floated under the fridge. Sometimes cleaning up has rewards. When I was a kid, I once found $7 in the pocket of a coat I had stuffed under my bed - and I felt very rich.

Cleaning up, or more accurately, clearing up can also have negative consequences. You know what I mean - that pile of papers that you sorted out three weeks ago has now been scattered into various files and folders. You are sure that you put the letter from a long-lost relative in that pile, but now you can't find it. It's sort of like when I was a teenager. I would have piles of clothes on the floor of my room. To the casual observer (ie: my parents) it was a right-royal mess. But I could find any item of clothing within a very short time because I knew exactly where everything was. Clean up the mess and I wouldn't have been able to find a thing.

I try to keep my desk at work reasonably tidy. In my younger days I used to be able to push all the mess to one side and do my homework on the other. But not anymore. I have evolved such that I actually require a clutter-free desk. I recently cleared a whole lot of unnecessary stuff off my desk at work - like multiple pen holders, excess notebooks, old and irrelevant papers, those little yellow sticky notes that seem to get everywhere, old paper clips and used, mangled staples.

Actually, it is interesting to note what sort of things people put on their desks. I work with someone who tends to put as little on his desk as possible. I like that minimalist approach - if you don't need it, get it off the desk. I have noticed others (not necessarily in my group) who seem to put as much on their desks as possible - family photos, nick-knacks from the conference they attended in 2001, trinkets from work, gifts from suppliers, little clay models their kids made in 3rd grade, commemorative mugs, logoed clocks of all descriptions, mountains of tissue packets and so on. Actually, until very recently I was inadvertently building a tower of used disposable coffee cups that I seem to have collected over the weeks (yuk).

What's on your desk?

Murphy's Law

Murphy's Law: If something can go wrong, it will go wrong.

Here are a few variations:

• A major problem always happens ten minutes before it's time to go home.
• Whenever you set out to do something, something else must always be done first.
• The legibility of a copy is inversely proportional to its importance.
• Matter will be damaged in direct proportion to its value.
• A failure will not appear until a unit has passed final inspection.
• The other line always moves faster.
• Leftovers always expand to fill all available containers plus one.
• Machines that have broken down will work perfectly when the repairman arrives.

Here is Wikipedia's take on Murphy's Law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murphy's_law (If this link doesn't work it would be embarassing for me, necessarily invoking Murphy's Law, which means that, of course, the link I provided will not work. But then again, now that I have said all that, if the link does work, then it makes a fool out of me for having said that the link won't work. So according to Murphy's Law the link I provided will work. In other words, if the link works or if it doesn't work, Murphy's Law ensures that I am both a winner and a loser - let's call it even, then, shall we?)

Jerry Garcia's Missing Toilet

This is my 30th post. What better way to celebrate this milestone than to discuss Jerry Garcia's missing toilet. Apparently (according to FOXNews.com) the salmon-coloured can was sold to an online casino for $2,550. Now the casino is offering $250 as a reward for the missing loo. I reckon they, like their customers, are just flushing more money down the chair. But then again, this is the same casino that paid "$25,000 for William Shatner's kidney stone and $28,000 for a grilled cheese sandwich that reportedly had the image of the Virgin Mary on it" - so I suppose this was a bargain.

Oddly, this story is stranger than it sounds because, you see, the dunny was stolen from a driveway. Now, who goes and buys a lav for $2,550 and then leaves it in the driveway? For goodness sakes. After all, this near-priceless porcelain throne was the subject of a legal wrangle and, yet, was left unguarded. Just the sort of thing to attract any passing potty pilferer.

I wonder if one can get insurance on a famous WC, like one could get insurance on a famous painting.

Insured: I can't believe that you are charging that much to insure my thunderbox!
Insurer: Sorry, ma'am. Since Jerry's john was nicked, powder room, bathroom, restroom, latrine, conveniences and outhouse insurance have all risen sharply. However, I can offer you a lower premium if you agree to fit an alarm to the seat.

The funny thing is that I have a Spanish-made retrete sitting at the entrance to my house - don't we all? The truth is that we are about to do renovations and our commode has been patiently waiting by the front door to be installed in it's proper place. The difference here is that mine only cost a fraction of what Jerry's did, but should I be worried that my privy will go walkabout?

And, yes, the whole point of this blog was a challenge to see how many different polite synonyms I could use to describe "the room without a mezuzah" or the item found within. I count 21 (or 20 without the Spanish translation).

Danger Is My Middle Name

I, for one, am not into horror movies, let alone bungee jumping off a 400 meter bridge over torrential waters. Some people thrive on such things. What are they trying to prove?

Some people have no fear. Is that a good thing?

Truth be told, when you go to a circus and you see them flying through the air on a trapeze without a net, you go "Wow. I wish I could do that". But at the same time you think that the guy who shoves his head inside the mouth of a lion is just an idiot.

When I was younger I used to launch my bike (with me on it) from an elevated ramp over bricks and other items. I did this without the slightest hesitation - no fear on two wheels. But once, when I was about twelve years old, I went to a swimming pool where there was a three-meter diving board. After ten minutes of psyching myself up, I managed to climb the ladder and jump into the water. What a rush. Really, it was. But you see, that is different from, say, sky-diving. With jumping off a diving board into a pool, you really know in your heart of hearts that it is not dangerous - and you can see others jumping off the diving board all afternoon. So it isn't that difficult to convince yourself to do it. With sky-diving, well, even though you can see others jumping out of the plane you know in your heart of hearts that the dangers are very real and that there are so many variables that the chance of something going wrong is higher. So it is far more difficult to convince yourself to take the plunge.

Apparently there exists a "danger gene". According to this article in Science News (November 2005) scientists discovered that there is a gene that controls fear, at least in mice. If you remove that gene, you get interesting results. The scientist being interviewed says that, "The results suggest a genetic explanation for why some people are daredevils while others are racked by phobias". I hope that I fall somewhere in between.

Work took us on an outing last week. One of the activities was to crawl through a cave. The entrance was not very wide and you really had to get down on your belly to crawl inside the cave. I found that I couldn't do it. I tried twice but I really couldn't go through with it. I started to feel sick as soon as I poked my head into the cave. I opted out and waited top-side for the others to emerge. I suppose that I discovered that either I am claustrophobic or that the thought of crawling through underground crevices with tons of rock overhead doesn't thrill me. Either excuse will do.