Thursday, January 24, 2008

the fabulous flying pistachio

Or, why I am next in line to be certified crazy during this Minnesota winter. :)

There was a wonderful moment at work today, totally unplanned which made it all the more funny. Background info: I work in a small office room that holds four of us during the worst times. At least we have a few dividers; from my vantage point I can totally ignore the boss when he comes in to tell outrageous stories like Hap Shaughnessy from Red Green.

Anyway, today I was finishing off my day's ration of pistachio nuts at about 3:00. I have been enjoying them as a snack, no sugar and lots of micronutrients! I came to the last nut, which was in a shell that hadn't fully opened...

I panicked for a while. How would I get this nut open? I mean, once you eat one pistachio you gotta have another, and so on, so this was really a crisis. ;)

Finally I came up with a brilliant plan. I would crush the offending nut with a pair of scissors I had in my desk. I strongly gripped the nut in the scissors.

What happened then could not have been planned more perfectly.

The nut somehow slipped the grip of scissors. The scissors were arbitrarily pointed in the direction of a coworker's desk, one I had never given the thought to of perhaps hitting with a pistachio nut in the near future. AS IF....I had ever thought of using pistachio nuts as a weapon!

So... the wayward pistachio went hurtling through the air, over a bookcase. A split second later, it landed, with a "ping" against the Microfiche reader my coworker was using to age fish scales (yes, how archaic) and into a Petri dish he was using to hold water to wet the scales.

"What the...is THAT?" he remarked.

I was already doubled over and in tears from laughter.

Now, you have to understand, John, my coworker, is the king of ironic, cynical humor. (And he is a diehard Packers fan, so he is understandably going through a period of mourning.) Nevertheless, he managed to mention that perhaps we should fill out a "near miss" accident form, so the regional safety committee could take up the issue of flying pistachio nuts. He thought he could have been blinded, or even killed by a pistachio to the right spot on the temple.

*snort* *chortle* HAHAHA!

I could not have aimed that pistachio better if I had tried. And I laughed about it all the way home. :)

Oh well, laughter is good medicine, and I have been needing it lately.

7 comments:

R.Powers said...

I've heard people go nuts in the Minnesotarctica winter.

Anonymous said...

Laughter IS good medicine-glad yougot a dose. I absolutely love pistachios and have not had any for a while. Now I may have to get some on the way home!

Anonymous said...

That was funny - I could just see the whole thing playing out!

gtr said...

Aging scales with a microfiche! I've done that! (with a guy named John years ago, but I think a different John). Sans pistachio nut missiles, of course.

Although when I was a young education intern gathering info from the helpful agency, I first heard the machine name as "microfish" machine, and was surprised to see it was the same thing used in libraries. Ha!

Deb said...

FC- I think I'm past gone nuts.

Momadness- they are a good snack, laugh value or no.

Kathie- for a moment there I didn't recognize you...but I have updated the link on my blog to Two Frog Home. Glad you saw the humor playing out!

GTR- I never would have thought I would find someone who has aged fish scales with a "microfish"! Yeah, the old technichians called it a "microfish", but it was always a "microfiche". I wonder if my fisheries division is planning ahaed for the inevitable obsoletity. (obsolescense? I don't know...)

RuthieJ said...

Isn't it great that you have co-workers you can laugh with! The alternative is much worse.

Deb said...

RuthieJ- Yes, I'm fortunate that the stress level here is very, very low.