Crisis Inducing Spouses

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (in the Secondary phase of the Radio play I think) has the cloned archaeologist Lintila who has a crisis inducer- a device designed purely to create a crisis to make you work harder because bored people are less productive. "Nothing is more useless than a bored archaeologist". Obviously she lived alone. Those of us who are married or live with someone know that such an item would be redundant. Significant others have the knack of inducing crises down-pat. Who better than your beloved life partner to take the time and effort to randomly create those dramas that mean life shall never become too dull or predictable? Becoming bored or stale with your own routine and systems that unfailingly push you long through life's chores and errands is simply not a problem. I know I can regularly be enormously appreciative of Matt for ensuring my life does not become too monotonously organised and structured. I'm pretty sure I return the favour by inducing several colourful crises myself. Today was a prime example fit to illustrate my point. Monday mornings are not my shining, happy time of the week. It signals the end of the weekend, the fun and relaxed freedom of that time, and the commencement of the working week*. Working week is boring time. I make sure I arrive at work early enough to prepare for the day, be there in time to make a coffee and get a good seat for morning Staff briefing. My day is dictated by timetables and meeting schedules. Routine followed by more routine. However, nothing induces a little adrenaline-fuelled crisis more than frantically realising as I'm about to leave the house that Matt has left with my keys. I ran around for a while suspecting that I had in fact lost my keys in a subconscious effort to induce my own crisis. However, this was not the case. I discovered Matt's keys lying gloating in their smugness on the table gleefully proving that Matt must have in fact driven with my keys. Crisis decision-making point: Do I wait and hope Matt realises he has the wrong keys and comes back home? Do I grab the spare key for the car and rely on my lock-picking skills to break into my classroom at school? I realise that I in fact, unlike many of my better thought-out Roleplaying characters, have neglected to pick up any lock-picking skills. For a while I contemplate that I am missing several essential skills needed in many con-type scenarios. Would I have a reasonable dodge skill? Maybe. I make a mental note to practice dodging more often and see if I can take a course in lock-picking at one of those community education places. The minutes flash past. There is no sign that Matt will return or that I will spontaneously level up thus obtaining the much needed lock-picking skills. I decide to leave. I run out to the car and reverse out of the garage and down the driveway in record time. My heart is pounding. Only 7 minutes until Staff Briefing (or T-7 as I prefer to think of it). I pull into school and park my car. I dump my lunch in the kitchen and do necessary photocopying at a ruthless speed that frightens both myself and the photocopier (the beast otherwise known as 'lesser nemesis' - the Risograph is the true Super Villain of resource copying). My crisis fuelled fingers nimbly swipe my card into the photocopier and it dares not to misread my card for once! My lightning digits tap out instructions - number of copies, double-sided, A4. It's all go. I stand there grabbing the warm flurry of sheets and deftly punch holes through the whole pile before they even have a chance to know what is going on**. This is the stuff that legends are made of. It's now T-3. I have 3 minutes to find a key that will let me open my classroom and the resource cupboard as I need a video-player for period 3. I find a teacher who I can borrow a key from! Heh. On fire. I bound over to my class. I write my Advance Organiser and Starting Questions on the board for first class. The Whiteboard pens squeak submissively but dare not run out. T-1 Having finished preparing my classroom and en route at power-walking speeds to the staffroom. Coffee and good seat shall not be denied me! Not on this watch. T-0 Clutching cup of coffee and happily ensconced in a comfy chair with padding and arms, the staff briefing begins. I can still feel the adrenaline and feel vastly more awake than usual for a Monday morning. After the staff briefing I'm about to leave when the school's secretary comes up to me and tells me I have to go to the front office. Huh? I thought only naughty kids got sent there or ones who forgot their lunch or something. I wander over and see that Matt is waiting there with my keys. He drove all the way from his school. Crisis over (for me anyway - I guess he had to get back and was running late). With the security of my own keys, I rapidly begin to feel a little relaxed and sluggish. What a relief to be back to normal. * The working week is a time regulated by external signals and contains little choice. You wake up when the alarm goes off, you start and end classes when the bell rings, you eat during the lunchtime and can only go to the bathroom during interval and lunch breaks. ** Which I suspect is the key to organising one's photocopying. Ordinarily the sheets of paper have time to consort and form a plan when they emerge from the copier. One piece of paper in the middle will somehow manage to avoid get hole-punched, others will ever so slightly sneak up or down so the holes won't be centred and sheets will stick to other pieces of paper and not get printed on. Then there are the kamikaze ones who sacrifice themselves by getting jammed just to screw up the print run.