Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Pride comes ...

This afternoon, about an hour after lunch, my eyes were threatening to close on their own. It was time for a coffee break. So I repaired forth to the kitchen. There was no fresh coffee - so I enterprisingly made some.

About the time I finished getting my freshly brewed coffee, my colleague P also came in to get coffee. He was busy mixing coffee, creamer and sugar when he muttered, "Oh darn - I did it again." It turned out that after he had emptied the contents, he had inadvertently dropped the empty packet of Splenda also into his coffee. So there on the top of the coffee in his mug, floated an yellow Splenda cover.

As he fished out the cover with a stirrer, P said, "I just did that this morning and there I go and do it again now." I laughed and then acting all prim and proper said, "That's so careless of you. I am not careless you know. I have never done something like that."

And then walked back to my cubicle. I was feeling very thirsty. As soon as I settled into my chair, staring at something on the monitor, I reached for my almost-full water bottle. Reach it I did - only thing, instead of grasping it, I knocked it over.

The next moment, a pool of water rapidly started spreading across my desk and started dripping down. Onto my chair. And onto my skirt. As I leapt away from my desk, I stared in dismay at some soaked papers and more distressingly, at the huge water stain on my skirt.

Of course, the next half an hour or so saw me glued to my seat till the water could dry off. That also gave me plenty of time to think about why I should not try to act holier than thou when pointing out other people's shortcomings. Sigh :-(!

p.s. I spotted the silver lining soon enough. It could have so easily been the coffee instead of water. Thank God for small mercies!

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

LOL! :--) I have done them too. Both dropping equal into coffee and fishing it out, and spilling water on the desk. :--)
My Manager once spilt coffee on himself and on his desk, while interviewing a candidate ;--) Was very funny, when he explained it to the candidate.

Also another thgt, keep water bottle closed unless when drinking :--)

Anonymous said...

The water stain on your skirt would have dried quicker if you had taken a leisurely walk along your office floor. hehe :-)

Archana said...

SK - oopz, in an interview. That must have been super embarassing - hehe! It was closed - just that I had not tightened the lid :-(((!

Anon - yeah right X-(!

Anonymous said...

been there, done that! I jumped into my track pant asap. But it was funny. I made an entired trip to the restroom, brought water and sat down only to knock it over my jeans and then did the whole elaborate trip all over again this time with an added task of changing into my tracks.

Anonymous said...

well.. once I had this coffee cup between my desktop keyboard and my laptop.. and when I had to switch m/c's, I hit my coffee cup which in turn quietly poured the coffee onto my laptop.. I saw my laptop power off. and when I turned it upside down, about half cup coffee came out.. and that was the end of that laptop, except that I could take the hdd out and put it into the new one that company had for me :)


you were just fine.. wait till the day you do it with coffee and you will feel this was nothing.

rads said...

*giggle*
:D

The Kid said...

I have never put paper into my coffee, nor have I have ever knocked water bottles or some such.

It really is a blessing to be me :)

Vishesh said...

pride comes before a fall??

who cares...??

but i tht there was a rule never to bring any liquid close to the comp..??or linux has some spl,soft ware which has a hardware which uses coffee??

Archana said...

Anon - LOL :-))! I knew I could count on you :-P!

T - This is funny "and when I turned it upside down, about half cup coffee came out" :-D! I feel much better after hearing your story!

Rads - LOL :-D!

Pratap - tell me, does it ever get boring, being the epitome of perfection in everything :-P?

Vishesh - if they made a no-liquid rule, about 99.999% of the software engineers in the world will collapse due to lack of caffeine - hehehe :-)!

ACE !! said...

LOL :) :) i would also like to join the official "WCSC" (water coffee spillers club).. :) :)

Munimma said...

Funny! I have done the splenda thing too, but always make sure my water bottle is tightly closed ;-)
Have you ever opened something, thrown the stuff in the trash and the cover/wrap in the dish? That's me!

Robbie said...

Hey,
I thought it was me who did this always but I am glad its also someone else. haha! well we give cavalier advice dont we?
hmm! I wouldn't think twice about doing that again though. It runs in my blood. I am Indian:))

Archana said...

Ace - welcome aboard - lol :-)!

Munimma - yes, done that too :-). Have also done things like putting the aluminium foil/cling wrap box into refrigerator after using it etc. etc.

Robbie - hehehe :-)! That's where our collective expertise lies :-))!