Pitchforkin' Away

Summer, 2012

I stood in the cool mid-morning breeze and looked at the labryinthine barn, pitchfork in hand. It was a series of sheds connected by other sheds, decades' worth of add-ons and additions. Who knew how far back it went, it was hard to tell. What I did know was that there was a large flock of goats who made their abode there, as well as an impressive amount of manure; and, as you may have guessed, that's why I was there. Upon entering, I discovered the extent of the need to get the manure mucked out: in some places it was a mere six inches deep, in others, a foot. I was getting paid by the job, which meant the quicker I got it done, the quicker I could get out of there, so I set to. It didn't smell too bad at first, but once you got all that straw mixed with months of goat urine and droppings thrown around a bit, the dust became oppressive and the smell repugnant. My trusty wheelbarrow didn't fail me though, and together we moved load after load to the large trailer hooked up to the tractor out front.

After a good while I made it to the largest area of the shed compilation. Besides an astounding amount of muck, this one particular stall also had a very oddly placed metal beam, about an eighth inch wide, connected the ceiling to the base of one of the walls. I wondered why in the world they decided to build it that way, but since the whole shed-upon-shed thing was already weird enough, I didn't think too much about this strange metal beam and set to work. I avoided the beam the whole time, which kind of got annoying since it cut straight through the stall and made it somewhat awkward to maneuver around, but hey, what could I do. After that I moved on to the next stall, and then the next and the next. Finally, some time later, as I was taking out another wheelbarrow load, I noticed something fishy: the metal beam wasn't in the same place, it had moved slightly! I set the wheelbarrow done and moved in for a closer inspection. I got real close to the beam and looked at it intently.... hmm. I positioned my hand to grab the beam, then brought it in to take hold of it.. except... MY HAND WENT STRAIGHT THROUGH THE LITTLE METAL BEAM!! I had no idea what had just happened, I was totally shocked. I passed my hand effortlessly through it time and again, completely consumed in awe. And then, it struck me. I looked up and sure enough, there was a little hole in the tin roof, and the little metal beam was actually just sunlight. The air was so dusty that the bright sunlight on the obscenely high concentration of dust particles made it appear to be a solid physical object!

Some time later I had finally filled up that huge trailer and gotten every scrap of manure out of the shed-barn-conglomeration. All that was left to do was drive the tractor over to the dumping spot and offload it all; I was almost done! Not only that, but I was in fresh air again and didn't have to struggle to breath anymore. That, along with the fact of being almost done, urged me on to greater things and I started forking out the manure faster than I'd ever gone before. This hastiness may have been the main contributor to my demise. All at once I made a simple mistake: I tried to scoop up some manure that, unfortunately, my foot was under. I felt an odd feeling in my left foot, at the same time as my pitchfork came to an abrupt stop. My smile fell. I slowly looked down at my left foot. One of the forks had gone straight through my leather boot, in one side and clean out the other. And it wasn't just through the a little bit of it either: it entered near the middle of my foot area and exited at an angle toward my toe. AND I DIDN'T FEEL A THING. I gulped. My foot was probably so messed up that my pain registers had shut down to help me not go into shock or something. I winced, then tried to wiggle my toes... then my whole foot.. it felt great! I breathed a huge sigh of relief as a nervous laugh echoed ominously, resonating from.. well, myself I guess. I gave the pitchfork a solid tug, and yanked it out of my boot. There was no blood, and then I really believed my foot was fine. I continued working after that, but slower this time. I immediately decided to say not a word of this to anyone for at least three or five years. And I didn't. Not a word. Sometimes it's better for stories of danger and near-misses to age a little bit before one tells one's mother, for the safety and sanity of all.

Murphy's Law At Its Finest

On your average day, I'm one of those guys who really hates being stuck at a stoplight. I will go out of my way to avoid them, even if it means adding another minute or two to my drive. And for me, it's worth it. Today, however, was a different story. I turned left at a stop sign right after a copcar had done the same, except I had to wait for a few pedestrians to cross first. As such, he got to get to the redlight first and wait. I pulled up behind him a moment or two later. Immediately, I realized something was going wrong. There was a FedEx truck on the other side of the road, but he wasn't moving. He was stationary. Very stationary. I imagine he was busy delivering a package and that's why the truck was so stationary. Now, as scientific studies have shown, stationary vehicles are more than twice as likely to impede traffic flow when on roadways than their non-stationary peers. Now I, personally, can confirm that this study has at least some empirical evidence to back up its claims. There was a string of cars behind him waiting to get going, and then there was one car, the last one in line, who also tried to make the light and turn onto the clogged road. This didn't end so well. The light turned red and then traffic from the other direction had a fairly difficult time getting around this individual in the middle of the intersection. There were also two cars trying, and failing, to back out of their coffee shop parking spots. They couldn't accomplish their goal because myself, the copcar, and the car in front of him were stuck at the light. I also realized at that moment that had I noticed before pulling up behind the copcar that the FedEx truck was in fact stationary and there was a pile of cars behind him, I could've hugged the right side of the road so there'd be enough space for them to squeeze by and so solve the traffic problem that was developing. But unfortunately, I was not paying enough attention to notice this before a car pulled up behind me and locked me in position.

Well, it couldn't get much worse than this. At least the light was about to change. Finally, after what seemed like ages, we got the green. But you know what? The car in front of the copcar wanted to turn left, and guess who was still in the middle of the intersection blocking everything? You already know who it is. That Guy. So then the car who wanted to turn left did what any reasonable person would do under these circumstances: he gave up on going left and decided to go straight and slightly readjust his travel plans so that all the cars that had piled up behind me could get by. He took one for the team. Or at least, that what we all hoped he'd have done. In reality though, he decided he'd be better off if he just waited for the car to move so he could turn left like he wanted. Time passed. More cars piled up behind me and in the left turn lane of the other road. The light turned red. The cross-traffic painstakingly maneuvered themselves around That Guy in the intersection. Slowly. Finally, the cops in front of me had had enough. They threw open their doors and jumped out very determinedly. One headed for the car in front of them to tell them to go straight to alleviate traffic, while the other headed for the FedEx truck to get him to move ASAP. Now, I'd been laughing and chuckling to myself throughout this entire ordeal because it was just too much, but the cops actually getting out of their squad-car was the icing on the cake. Or was it? Just then the FedEx truck's engine roared to life and he started to lurch forward. The one cop, visibly frustrated, immediately turned around and called to his buddy, and they both hopped back in their car. As the line of cars finally drove on by, the cops honked angrily at That Guy who had managed to block the entire intersection. Soon enough the light changed again and everybody was stonefacedly going on their way, annoyed at the unnecessary stupidity and trafficjam. And then there was me, laughing my head off as I turned left and made it through just in time to hit the yellow light and make it up 6th street. Life is truly a joy, even with all its unforeseen roadblocks.

Still tho, don't be That Guy. Please.