Weird morning, so far.

After going to bed extra early last night, I awoke more tired than usual. It was an actual struggle to get out of bed this morning. I have no idea why. I did the usual shit, shower, and shave on autopilot.

When I finally, was coherent enough to realize what I was doing, I was lacing up my work boots. I try not to think about the inherent dangers of shaving during a semi-conscious state.

Then, the shit ht the fan. I can only describe the sound I heard as a collective sigh throughout the building. The sound of everyone’s electricity turning off at the same moment is actually pretty cool. It produces an eerie silence, though.

Since it was only 7:30, I was momentarily worried that everyone would sleep through the morning, since their alarm clocks now ceased to function. I thought about knocking on their doors, waking them up, but then I thought better of it.

Who wants some idiot banging on their door, waking them up because their alarm clocks are malfunctioning? Not me. I’d rather oversleep and explain it to work later. So I shrugged, and went down to the garage, where I keep my car.

By the way, the floodlights were working on every floor except mine, a job well done by the crack team of maintenance professionals.

So naturally, I wander over to the garage door, and stare up at the motor. Of course, it’s not going to work. But I pushed the button just in case it was on its own backup generator or something. By the way, it’s not.

So now I’m staring at this dangling cord attached to the garage door, which can only be a manual release of some kind. I figure, if I pull on it, it will act as a pulley, and raise the door. So I give it a tug.

The chain falls down, releasing a bar of some kind. The door remains firmly closed. “What the Hell?” I ask myself. I look for a handle to raise the door, fully knowing that it is damn hard to raise a heavy garage door by oneself. Not being able to locate one, I realize that I have broken the garage door, and extricate myself from the garage to the main hall, so no one will realize that I am a complete and utter fool.

Naturally, I called into work and explained that the power was out in the building and I couldn’t get my car out of the garage. I told them I would be late. “No problem,” they said.

I wandered out into the main hallway to find someone else reentering the building. He said that the power was out for blocks, and that he had heard some sort of an explosion earlier. Possibly a transformer blowing up, or something. Not having a better excuse, I agreed with his assumptions.

I walked around the building to the driveway, to see if I could somehow summon up Herculean strength to raise the garage door from the outside, when I see a car exiting the other garage, and driving down to the street.

Confused, I flagged her down, and she explained to me how to activate the manual release. The first time through, I wasn’t paying much attention, as I was thoroughly distracted by her beauty. Sorry.

So she explained it again: “What you want to do is pull down on the chain release.”

“Uh huh.”

“That will allow the door to be free from the motor, and then you can raise the door.”

“Really. How did you raise the door?”

“Err…By hand?”

“Huh.”

“So after you…”

“Do you want me to show you?”

“Please,” I smile, gratefully.

So I lead her back through the dark hallway to the garage, where it turns out, I didn’t break the door by yanking on the chain.

Together, we raised the door. I felt like an idiot; it must have weighed ten pounds.

So now, not only am I feeling totally humiliated that I can’t work a garage door, I am also feeling total anxiety, that the only thing separating car thieves from my beloved Blazer is a door made of balsa wood.

Have a good day.

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