Are You Using That?

Maybe it’s the stress of the job, or the frustration of trying to get the last of the science equipment delivered for the lab or simply the loneliness of living so far away from home.  But I have noticed that the very patient person who arrived in the UAE last September has gone away.  Perhaps that patient person is hiding in the vacant desert sands or has drowned in the sadness within; wherever he maybe, he isn’t here and in his place is a slightly quick tempered man with a few new irritating pet peeves that make him want to jump on a desk and scream.

It boggles my mind when I get to the photocopier only to find the person who used it last created a paper jam in 4 different places and flew the scene like a thief in the night.  They think a paper jam is brain surgery and much to complicated.  You know finding that door handle in front of the machine and turning the knobs till the paper comes out is so hard, I think it uses as much brainpower as figuring out the derivative of a quadratic equation.  Once I get the paper jam out and load up the paper tray because of course the fleeing-paper-jammer used up all the paper too; I can begin my photocopying.  Once I close the cover, punch in the number of copies and press start I hear that question that makes me want to jump on a desk and scream… ‘Are you using that?’

I don’t even know what to say to that?  Like no, I like to stand by a working photocopier in hopes the radiation makes me sterile!  And the same goes for the computers at school, it’s as if they wait for you to sit down at the computer so they can ask you if you are done with the computer.  Do you see the startup-loading bar, its only halfway, do you think I’m done with the computer!?

But that is nothing compared to when in the middle of a meeting at school discussing school related matters when the other teachers decide to switch from English to Arabic and I’m left there in the dark.  I know you see me as the outsider, but lets keep with the language we all understand please!

Bryan The Camel says…

            Are you using the computer?