So I’ve come to the belated conclusion that there must be something just a bit off kilter about myself, a conclusion I’m sure my wife and others acquainted with me have either known for some time or certainly suspected.
I’m not sure if my polarity is reversed, my electromagnetic field is on the fritz, my karma needs rebooting, or I am simply poor at beating the odds. Scientifically speaking, my luck in certain areas is practically non-existent.
How else to explain the fact that there should be a 50 percent chance of inserting a USB device into a computer port the first time, but my percentage hovers near zero? (I know, a lot of the USB devices are helpfully marked to tell you which side is up, but usually I’m inserting them when either I or the computer are upside down and in dim lighting under a desk with my head banging into something.)
And electrical plugs are the same. OK, I readily admit that, again, I don’t take the time to look at the plug, see where the big prong is, line it up with the big slot, and plug it in. I prefer the method that worked when I was a kid and we didn’t worry about electrical safety but made up for it with equality of electrical pronghood sizes: you just shoved the sucker in and it fit.
You would think that occasionally I would guess correctly but you would be wrong and I have plenty of bent prongs on my plugs to prove it. And of course you are already nodding to yourself that, yes, I bet all of his extension cords are knotted in a hopeless mess even though he carefully rolled them up the last time he put them away.
It could be that all that useless jabbing at outlets and untangling cords has sent my electromagnetic field out of whack because something sure does cause stoplights to turn red every time I drive up to one.
Then there are garden hoses, the bane of my outdoor existence. Do you know how much money I’ve spent on hoses guaranteed not to kink? All I have to do is touch a hose and it instinctively kinks up, and if I drag one across the yard it automatically snags on a rock or a twig or sometimes even an invisible obstacle that only it can see. My hoses do not wind or unwind on those hose winder devices that are supposed to let them effortlessly whir in and out of sight because, well, they just prefer not to.
And, no, my hoses now hibernating for the winter in my basement are not all neatly coiled in loops, awaiting a kinkless spring of leakless watering because I refuse to wrestle them into submission any more, preferring to save them the trouble of tangling themselves up by simply dragging them pre-snarled into the dank, dark basement where they can rot for all I care.
Anyway, I try not to let all this get to me – OK, the hoses are still bothering me – because I realize that I am fortunate in many ways and that I am proficient, competent and not lacking in expertise in many areas.
I’ll write a post about them just as soon as I think of some.
Good one Tim 👍