Waiting for Lunch
Feeling somewhat better today. Still thankful for the existence and effectiveness of painkillers, but definitely better. I'm actually at work right now, and typing because the phones have slowed down. Everything was crazy this morning, the phones ringing constantly, but now there is a lull. I imagine people sitting around eating their sandwiches and microwave lunches, scratching the Town's number on their brown paper lunch bags, saying "I will call soon. Soon I will complain about my neighbours, and ask for road maps, and speak to the Mayor, and yell at Karina about how the Building Department never picks up their phones--but now, now I will eat my roast beef sandwich and drink this can of Diet Coke."
Or something to that effect.
Some have expressed disbelief over the calls recorded in my earlier entry, N Calls. (Foolish disbelievers!) No, actually, that was accurate, and not a particularly busy time here on switchboard. If it was all silence and spare time, I'd write more journal entries at work, that's for sure. Still, even in this dead-silent time, I've answered the phone 17 times since starting this entry. And though I'm not breaking any records with my typing, I'm not exactly a glacial typist, either.
What else? Started Connie Willis'
To Say Nothing of the Dog today at break, which is starting for me as all Connie Willis stories do, which is to say not particularly quickly or in a particularly interesting fashion, and yet I don’t care because I have come to trust Connie Willis. I am never blown away by the opening chapter, and yet by the end of the novel I am absorbed, lost in the book and oblivious to the world, happy with Connie Willis.
This is the book I got at Bakka over the weekend, for which I was almost not given the author's discount. I'd never tried to get the author's discount before, but Sarah had said such nice things and I’m not one to balk at saving money, and so I tried. And was allowed to get away with it, even though I was told that I wasn’t quite cool enough for this discount, that I might not get away with it in the future, that my paltry publication credits would be rebuffed at the checkout counter some time in the near future. Which was, I admit, not the greatest moment for me, especially standing with two other author-friends who had received said discount without pause or argument. Damn me and my small press credits, anyway. Who do I think I am? LCRW, indeed.
My call tally has crept up to 39. Wow, 39 is not a small number. I wonder how many calls I answer on a busy day. I have trouble answering the phone at home now, wanting to greet callers with "Good afternoon, Town of Caledon." I struggle to remember the word "hello." ("Ack, the phone is ringing. What do I say? WHAT DO I SAY??") And since beginning this paragraph, the tally has risen to 44.
And now, I'm happy to say, it's time for lunch.
