Saturday, June 09, 2007

Just testing, officer

I did learn one valuable new lesson this past week. Apparently it is a lesson that most people learn in school, or college at the very latest.

The lesson? If you see a red button, don't push it.

Our new fancy building has a gym. Which I used for the first time on Thursday. You have to use your swipe card to get in the gym. So I assumed that you would need to push the red button next to the door to get out. Right?

So I worked out, showered, and sashayed out the door in my super cute Argentine dress which I love love love. It's trippy - sort of 60s, with faces and swirly flowers all over it. It's synthetic, but a really soft, clingy fabric. It's so great. And it's finally warm enough again to wear it, and did I mention I love it? I'll have to post a picture one of these days.

So. Yippee! I had a great workout! And now I'm clean! And cute, because oh, my dress is so fabulous!

Mince to the door. Push red button. Silently think, "Bye cute, sweaty, working out boys!" Exit.

Except. Except that particular red button caused building management and the police to turn up at the gym two minutes after I'd traipsed out the door. La la la la.

Bob told me this. He said a couple guys left right after I did, and a few new ones came in. So when the police asked who'd pushed the button, they didn't know. And Bob lied and said he had no idea.

I was so embarrassed when he told me. I'm a first-born-rule-follower, really I am. What if they have me on camera? What if they bar me from the gym?

"They should label it emergency!"

"Uh, Lis, I think they do."

Oh. Oops.

5 comments:

  1. HA! HA! You couldn't resist the bright red candy button!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Too funny! Maybe spending to much time in other cultures as a kid prevented you from learning that red means "warning." I don't mean that to sound mean, but in the U.S. we were inundated with red=warning or special in a bad way or emergency.

    Like the red phone on the president's desk. If he picked up that phone, he could launch nukes all over the world

    Hey - if you see a red phone...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ha ha! I'm jealous! I've worked around all sorts of big red buttons, and I've rarely gotten to push one. The only time when I got to push one regularly was when my own project was screwing up.

    Pushing the big red button is fun! Expect when its your fault it has to be pushed.

    ReplyDelete
  4. DCup - Hmm. I never thought about that, but you make a valid point about color meaning different things in different cultures. I'll totally keep an eye out in DC for a red phone...

    VVK - I've learned my lesson. Staying far away from red buttons from here on out.

    ReplyDelete

Tell me about it.