Salamander
Fire Walking

Yesterday I thought I was going to have an early day at work. I was literally just packing up my desk when the head of another department came up to my office. After 45 minutes of him chewing me out (during which I said virtually nothing because he wouldn't let me get a word in) he finally decided he had to run to meet his wife. He did a good job of making me feel like shit, even though most of what he said was unjustified or distorted. He obviously came into my office needing to vent, and he certainly got his chance. He threatened to go over my (and my boss's) head to the CEO over some things that are currently being discussed. He also claimed that I'd said they were guilty of messing something up when I never said that; that was the one thing that I insisted on interrupting him on and getting a retraction about. I was really upset when I got home yesterday, but today I rather hope he does go over our heads to the CEO. It'll make a proper fool of him, without me having to do a thing. I rather like that resolution.

He also accused me of being "overexcitable" and "tending towards exageration". I nearly interrupted again to tell him that, if that were true, then it was in response to his department's "Hakuna Matata" approach to some of their responsibilities. I may reserve that retort for later, if he complains about me to anyone else. I will back off on any future attempts to convince them of the need for attention to detail on certain things. If they screw up, then it's their own fault.

Instead of getting home early, I didn't leave work until six. I went home depressed and guilty (even if I'm not a fault, getting reamed out makes me feel guilty). I spent the night replaying the "discussion" again in my head. Woulda, shoulda, coulda. Ended up going to bed earlier than is my wont, and continuing to stew. I probably fell asleep around midnight or so.

Two-thirty in the morning I was dozing when I heard the squeal of tires. It sounded closed enough to be just outside my window. The squeal culminated in a terrific bang of crumpling metal that is pathognomonic for a car crash. And then the car's horn started to blow in one, constant note. And wouldn't stop. So much for sleep.

The Professor was still up, and looking out the balcony door when I stumbled out of the bedroom. I hadn't seen anything out of the bedroom window, so I went looking for another vantage point. There was nothing to be seen at any of our windows, it turned out. I was surprised; it had sounded so close. The car horn seemed to go on forever; in reality I think it was finally cut off after about twenty minutes. Police started to gather in the corner of the parking lot closest to our building, but the building at the corner blocked my view of anything else. I went back to bed soon after quiet was restored, and I'd have sworn I never got back to sleep except that the sound of the alarm clock pinned me to the ceiling at 5:00.

I made a short detour before leaving for work, and checked out the corner of our parking lot where the police had gathered last night. There was a good deal of sand and grit scattered in the lot at the corner, and the bark was missing from about one third of the back of a tree nearby. It would seem that some cowboy tooling around after the bars closed lost it in the rain-slicked parking lot. It's a shame he had to take it out on the tree.