Ready... Aim...

We had a fire drill at work today.

This one was different from the carefree, happy-go-lucky emergency drills I remember from the other job. During this drill, all my coworkers filed out of the building in as orderly a fashion as their bleeding eardrums would allow, then gathered meekly at our designated end of the parking lot to be counted by safety monitors in orange vests, committing only the most minor acts of vandalism on the way.

Cheap American cars and their poorly-mounted side mirrors!

As a wearer of the Sacred Orange Vest, I had advance warning of the fire drill. Only we were told, out of my entire work group, with exhortations of the highest confidentiality, so I thought I was being quite naughty by whispering it to Bill at break. "Oh yeah, they sent an email out to everybody in my division," he said.

He's so hard to impress.

I wore the safety vest, but I did not do the safety dance; perhaps that comes later, after I've worked here a bit longer. I've also been issued a flashlight and earplugs. I could have used those last night at the Stereolab concert. In fact, a full range of personal protective equipment would have been nice.

Don't get me wrong: Stereolab is awesome! But as noted before, getting bumped around in a crowd of your fellow Stereolab fans is virtually indistinguishable from being jostled by David Lee Roth aficionados. And no matter what's coming out of it, you really don't want to be within arm's reach of a 10-foot-tall amp. This, in short, is just too close.

The upside is that my ears were already too stunned to be further distressed by the fire alarm. And I can play the new Stereolab album when I practice my moves for the next fire drill!