9 to 5 - Blown away

   

We have a good time, our team. 

We joke, we laugh, we tease each other.  There are even in-jokes which are based on stories or traditions which go back way before  I joined the team, but which I have been included in through the telling and retelling, the referencing and rereferencing. 

Say the word "SURPRISE!" in a certain accent and we all collapse in stitches.

There are three of us that are the key culprits.  Let's call my dear partners in crime Sarge and Beetle Bailey. 

We go and buy coffee at the little counter in our building at least three times a day. 

So we're down getting our caffeine boosts the other day, and I was chatting to one of the baristos.  He was standing between me and the counter with the milk and sugar, so I was talking towards anyone sprinkling nutmeg on their latte. 

I was telling him about the conversation I had with Fluffy Bear about him continually killing his horse because he took the wrong route down a mountain while playing a video game.  I don't care if both he and the horse come back to life - it's just cruel, that's what it is.  The one time the horse even died because of a wolf attack, for fuck's sake!

Baristo laughed and told me we should get two TVs.  I rolled my eyes and he said that he plays video games on his TV, and his wife sits next to him on the couch, headphones on, watching trashy reality TV shows on her laptop.

"If she told me I was mean to kill my horse," he quipped, "I'd be like: 'What's up, Honey?  Did one of the people on your show break a nail?' "

Of course I burst out laughing, and I do not - to put it mildly - have a quiet laugh. 

On the other side of the counter, I saw my colleagues as I lowered my head from it being thrown back for the guffaw.  Sarge and Beetle Bailey were both going "Sh!"

"Shut up!" I snapped at them.  "We're not in the office!  I don't have to be quiet!"

It took a moment, but I realized that there was someone at the milk and sugar counter.  She was a small woman and - I swear to God - I had not noticed her at all up until this point.  And I had yelled at my colleagues directly over her head.  I felt bad.

"Excuse me.  I just realized that I yelled right across you," I said to her.  "I'm so sorry.  That was very rude of me."

She nodded, not turning towards me or making eye contact, and told me it was OK.  She then proceeded to detail her medical condition which caused her to react to sound especially unexpected sounds at higher than normal decibel volume in a way that made her lose her balance, and she didn't have her walking stick that day but she was able to grab onto the counter so it was allright and thank you and she had to go now.

And she hobbled away.

And I'm thinking... What.  The.  Fuck?

Sarge and Beetle Bailey then gleefully proceeded to both describe and - of course! - demonstrate to me the woman's reaction to my laugh, which had apparently been to be blown sideways like a poor innocent bystander when the Roadrunner screams by.

So now I'm known as ShesSoLoudSheBlowsYouAway.

Ha. Ha. Bloody. Ha.

To read more in this series, click here.

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