Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1998 17:48:57 -0500
From: Kafka Dreams 
To: void
Subject: paranoia


I drink bottled water.  I usually have one of the small Poland Springs
bottles on my desk.  I refill it from the cooler periodically,
re-using it for days or weeks until it gets a bit stale (i.e. I can
taste yesterday's bad breathe on the spout), then I recycle it and buy
another bottle.  Lather.  Rinse.  Repeat.

I leave the bottle on my desk, at the right corner of my monitor.

I have recently determined, after getting irritated over my own
perceived forgetfulness, that I am NOT putting the bottle down
elsewhere and forgetting it.

It's vanishing on its own.

Thus reassured, but also concerned, I endeavored to keep enough
neurons noticing when I had a water bottle and when I didn't to
discover a pattern.

And the pattern I found is this:

  When the scary cleaning guy empties my trash in the evening, and I
  am here to observe the process, my water bottle is there the next
  day.

  When I leave before track pick-up, my water bottle is always gone
  the next day.

Ok.  So now the evidence points overwhelmingly to the scary cleaning
guy.

But, in order to get the water bottle, you have to reach across my
desk, across piles of papers that look a lot like garbage and crumpled
napkins and the occasional ketchup or mustard packet.  Across me, if
I'm there.  

But those garbage-like things never go anywhere.  Only my
often-still-half-filled-with-water bottle and the occasional empty
juice bottle (from lunch) ever vanish.

It's not fair.  I don't have enough spare brain power to hide my water
bottle AND remember where I put it.

But that's not what inspired me to share this little story.

It wasn't until I realized that I was thinking about this in terms of
"first they tried to drive me crazy, now they're just trying to
aggravate me into craziness" and "maybe he's a saliva-collecting
psycho" that I realized, I'm just a wee bit PARANOID.  

And, PERHAPS I NEED A VACATION.

Kelly J.
  "Everybody needs a little time away... I heard her say..."