Nanoprep 2017 Day 1: One For the History Books
By Robin de Voh on 2017-10-11
You know those days? The days where nothing seems to go right?
He did.
It all started simple - he knocked over a cup of coffee. Sadly, the coffee had spilled all over his laptop, which powered off rather quickly after that. It had not turned on again and the tech guy said it was probably a lost cause. Some of the coffee had also ended up in his lap, leaving a stain. Even though the day then seemed to calm down, he couldn't shake the feeling that this was going to be one of those days for the history books. And not in a good way.
He was completely right about that.
Not only had he accidentally let slip to a friend that said friend's girlfriend had been cheating on him for months, he'd also hit reply-all to an email that asked all employees for their availability for an upcoming company party. In that reply-all, he explained why he couldn't come. He'd intended to just reply to the original sender, the HR guy, because the reason was somewhat embarrassing. To all but him it was the highlight of the day. Hilarity at his expense.
He thought it couldn't get worse, but unlike before, he wasn't quite right about that.
While walking home from work, he slipped on something and his phone had dropped from his hand, onto the pavement. It had been a few weeks since he got it, and now the screen was cracked to the point where about half of it had just turned black and unresponsive. He'd slipped on dog shit, by the way, and in such a way that it had ended up on his pants as well. He'd scraped off as much as he could, but the smell had gone into the material and would require a good, thorough washing.
The bus ride home had been quite an adventure as well. The woman who had made the unfortunate call to sit down next to him sniffed a few times and looked at him and his stained pants in disgust. He buried his head in his hands and wondered whether this day was going to end soon. The woman eventually found an ally in the person sitting across them and both of them gave him glances of disgust. He buried his head deeper.
His phone buzzed and he pulled it out of his pocket to check what it was. A message from a friend, asking whether he wanted to come out for a beer. He responded, saying that after he'd gone home to take a shower and put on a fresh change of clothes, he'd be totally up for that, given how the day had gone.
When he got home, he saw he'd left the balcony door open. It had been a rainy day, and the floor was wet from the rain. He sighed and closed the door. He grabbed a towel from the kitchen and threw it on the wet spot. Not his problem right now.
After the shower, he got dressed and went out. He arrived at the bar and ordered a beer, after which he went to sit with his friend, who had already claimed at a table in the back.
"So, one of those days?" his friend said. "Don't get me started."
He told his friend about the amazing luck he'd had all day. His friend laughed loudly at his misfortune.
As he was about to finish his recounting, he accidentally -- yet, very fittingly, he thought -- knocked over his beer. It spilled over the table and onto his friend's lap, who jumped up in surprise.
Now it was his turn to laugh.