Tuesday, August 02, 2016

Getting lost on the elevator

Near the end of Toebzilla's walk this evening, I approached the ground level of the elevator to go back to my apartment.  This particular elevator is particularly slow.  While I'm waiting for the car to reach the bottom floor, a lady and her teenage son approached with their dog.  Toebzilla was well-behaved.  The other dog was a little excited.

As the elevator doors open, two tween girls exit and run off.  I walk into the car with Towbzilla.  The lady, her son and dog follow.  We both choose the same floor near the top.  As the elevator doors began to close, the two tweens re-enter the elevator.  They announce they got off on the wrong floor, for some obnoxious reason.  The lady and I don't say anything as the elevator doors are finally allowed to shut.  Now, for some reason, this elevator is rigged so that if the doors are held open for too long, when the doors are finally allowed to shut, they give off one long buzz while the doors shut at an extra slow speed.  So, let me just buzz to simulate that annoyance: "buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"  OK, the doors finally shut and the elevator starts to move upward.

The elevator stops at the 2nd floor.  The doors open.  No one enters and no one exits.  The tweens giggle while one of them explains how they keep getting out on the wrong floor.  As the doors shut again, I lean over and point to the buttons, saying "Ya'no, you generally use these buttons to choose floors on which you actually wish to exit."  The lady, who was bent over tending to her excited dog looks up at me with a big grin and chuckling.  As funny as that was, this comment unfortunately triggers the girls to go into several excuses about why they kept picking the wrong floors, including something about them just moving-in to the apartment complex, then something about some other girl that was apparently lost on the elevator just minutes before, and a story about them going to the wrong apartment earlier in the day.  

The lady cordially responds with a reconciliatory comment about how her son (the same in the elevator with us) once entered the wrong apartment on the wrong floor by walking in an older Chinese gentlemen.  I'm sure her son was thinking to himself "Thanks Mom!".

The tweens finally find their floor.  This allows the elevator to move upward unencumbered by any further wrong floor choices.  The lady, her son and dog exit on the same floor as I.  Toebzilla keeps his composure the whole ride up, despite the giggly tweens, multiple stops and the excited dog.  The lady and I cordially excuse ourselves with a couple of "take-cares".  

I reward Toebzilla for behaving, and our remaining walk back to the apartment was uneventful.