Cats and Cattiness

For Joe (HI JOE) and Nicole (HI NICOLE), the Schrodinger's cat joke: Schrodinger is driving along and gets stopped by a cop. The cop finds his behaviour suspicious and searches his car, including the trunk. When he opens the trunk, he says "oh my god, there's a cat in here and it's dead!" and Schrodinger says "Well NOW it is!"

Today: slept too late, made myself go to the gym. Came downstairs from the gym, went to grab a grocery cart. As I was pulling it back, someone walked into me. I half-turned around, about to say sorry, and saw this older woman, obviously rolling her eyes and pissed off. Because she had walked into me, while I was pulling out a shopping cart, which is what people do with shopping carts. And she wasn't leaving or going somewhere else, which might have meant her attention wasn't on the shopping carts, because she then pulled out her own shopping cart.

So I looked back and saw her being a bitch because she had walked into me. And I completely lost any ability to be gracious. I yanked the cart out and pushed it into the grocery store and mumbled a stream of invective and very obviously didn't smile at her when we bumped into each other (figuratively) again at the green juice.

Then I tried to turn my cart into the pharmacy aisle, but my arms were noodly from working out and I bumped a rack and a bunch of chapstick fell off. And this young employee who'd been talking to someone nearby came to my rescue and said consoling things about Monday and picked up all the lip balm while I apologized profusely and sort of cry-laughed.

I guess I could take some kind of lesson from that. Like, if I'd gotten up earlier I would have missed being walked into by an asshole. OMG, you guys - what if I've used up my Canadianness? What if I never apologize to someone who steps on my foot again? I honestly feel like I've reached some kind of threshold. Fear me.

Comments

Unknown said…
That joke is amazing. Schroedinger was the subject of my second favourite strip from my second favourite web comic: http://angryflower.com/387.html
November 6, 2017 at 4:06 PM
Nicole said…
That joke is fantastic.

Ugh, about the crabby lady. Why do people have to be like that? Why can't they just be nice? And the chap stick thing reminded me of the time at Costco when I grabbed a box of tampons and the WHOLE DISPLAY came tumbling down, all giant boxes of tampons.
November 8, 2017 at 5:25 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Super Dark Times

Image
 To my American friends, I'm sorry. Not in any kind of distanced, pitying, smug way, because I believe we are headed in a similar direction here in Canada, and I am sad and sick at heart. I told myself I wasn't hoping for the other outcome because I was afraid to, but I realize that I absolutely was, because I was not prepared for how bad this would feel.  Some random thoughts I am having about the whole thing. 1. I'm going to try not to hate anyone. For a while at least. I am totally cool with anyone else hating people that helped this happen. A lot of them did it out of hate. Some did it out of ignorance. Some are struggling and desperate and thought this was a solution. I know that's not an excuse, but it makes me think of when I read The Drowned and the Saved by Primo Levi. He said that he didn't feel like he could judge people who betrayed their fellow Jews for favours from their captors, because he was never given the opportunity and if he had he couldn't ...
Read more

Books Read in 2021: Four-Star YA Horror

Image
I am pretty well ensconced in the January doldrums. We are in a deep freeze, and after the major snow dump on Monday I never catch it snowing, and yet there are a few centimetres on the driveway by every evening. I'm happy with my decision not to take any office shifts for a few weeks - it's incredibly stressful, will only be more so now that people are pissed that we're not supposed to be reporting Covid cases, and I don't even get paid my regular library rate. But it does sort of make the days run together. I try to walk Lucy, but it's so cold she starts dancing around lifting up one paw after the other for me to warm with my mittens. We've tried paw covers but haven't found any that fit. So I walk her around the block and then bring her home and keep walking. It's been cold but not very windy, so walking is quite pleasant (I'm finally not too warm!)  I am rewatching The Golden Girls, which I don't think I ever watched all the way through befor...
Read more

I'm Sick

 Seriously you guys, I am SO SICK, and I have been stupidly engaging in presenteeism even though I am STRONGLY DISAPPROVING when other people do it. It's not because I think I owe anything to the school board (oh my goodness I do not). It's not because I have delusions of grandeur about how important my job is - wait, maybe I do, because at some of my schools my classes have already missed two weeks of library because of EQAO (which necessitated students writing exams in the library), and it's almost the end of the year, which means most of the librarians are closing the library to circulation soon if not now, and I really didn't want to make them miss one of the last library periods.  Also, and I am putting myself out there so try to be kind, I have realized that there is a dumb little part of people-pleasing oldest-child self that always suspects that if I call in sick people think I'm faking, so it's a tiny bit gratifying to go in and have people say oh my GO...
Read more