Yes/No/Cancel

Lunchtime! Vegetables au gratin, not bad after all. In our factory canteen you can only pay cash. We’re nearly the last one. I know of a couple of lunchrooms who do accept only chip cards which you can charge on an automat. This may have some advancements (you don’t have to mess with loose change), but after all, it’s just one step more between me and my food, isn’t it?

Spending the afternoon might become a challenge. My boss cares for the first hour with an unexpected meeting. Meeting is just another word for the collective comparison of PDAs and laptops among my troglodyte colleagues (Me have bigger club. Me leader!). I earn some disbelieving looks and return them with a Yes-I-am-using-paper-and-a-pencil-because-I-have-everything-under-control-anyway expression. — Surprisingly, this works. Even that good that my boss assigns a task to me which was scheduled to someone else in the beginning. I would never have believed that one day ragged paper and an IKEA pencil could become insignia of superiority. Question is: What do they think I want to show that way? That I care for the really important things? That I have everything in mind?

I spend the rest of the day setting up an experiment which is mainly manual work and taking notes. My colleagues are wondering why I’m always coming around instead of using the telephone. This makes me wonder which one is more disturbing: The phone ringing or someone knocking on the door? As for me, the phone causes more stress because it gives you the impression of total urgency: If you don’t pick up the receiver immediately, it will stop ringing and you will miss something important. But once you have picked up, you must start the conversation. If someone comes around, I can tell him to wait for some thirty seconds without him running away again. What do you think?