Locks and hairs

This feels strange... I had the whole evening planned out. I'd leave the office at around 4:30, go to the gas station to find someone sitting in my seat, so I'd grab some noodle soup at Chowking as well as a small halo-halo. Then I'd check out some shirts at the Nike Outlet store but not buy any, all before I read an issue of Newsweek to catch up on my backlog while having my usual cup of black coffee. By 7:30 my seat would be vacant, hopefully, and then I'd crack some words up to post on my blog. Lo and behold when I got here, all the tables were full, except mine.

This may sound strange to most, but my seat is never vacant at 4:45 in the afternoon.

So what do I do? I get my coffee and set up my laptop. Good bye noodle soup, halo-halo, window-shopping and Newsweek... the time space warp has once again foiled the best laid plans.

*****

Yesterday, I finally convinced myself to get a haircut. Hair was suddenly getting into my eyes, ears and gobbling up massive amounts of shampoo. Too bad really, I was getting used to having all that hair. Gave me something to mess up when I was bored and justified my use of a baseball cap for more casual occasions.

Back in high school, when glam rock was making way for grunge, having long hair was all the rage much to the chagrin of stuffy teachers and pesky parents. I once let my hair grow long enough to cover my face, though not yet long enough to tie it into a ponytail. That would've been so cool, I thought. But my mom had other ideas, and forced me to get a proper haircut by taking her scissors and chopping off a generous portion of my bangs. I looked in the mirror and there was nothing else to be done but go to the barber to try to remedy the situation.

Now in the adult world, no longer under the parental dictatorship that I've had to endure for years, I sometimes entertain the thought of growing my hair long once again. But I guess that won't happen yet, unless I find myself stranded on a deserted island for a year, perhaps. There's that awkward stage where your hair gets really scruffy looking but not long enough to tie up. It's irritating, and unless you wear a baseball cap all the time, just doesn't look good.

*****

At my boss' request, I broke into an office-mate's drawer this afternoon. Thanks to my amazing ability to open some of the toughest locks around the office (in the continuing quest for candies and foodstuff), I am the designated safe-breaker. This, however, was no ordinary lock that she had installed.

The locks on the drawers in the office are usually the inferior kind, easy prey for my small pocketknife. But because of a prior incident which in no way involved me nor my talents, she had the locks changed to a pricier and less vulnerable set. I spent around 20minutes trying to pick the lock but to no avail. This tact was going nowhere, I said to myself. But still undaunted, I tried another approach. The drawers were made of wood, and wood being easy to bend and manipulate, I made the gap between the lock bigger and soon the drawer slid open, revealing what my boss wanted to get.

Now another problem ensued, I couldn't put the drawer back into place. Somehow, the wood sprang back to its original dimensions, and despite my coaxing, the lock jutted and wouldn't fit. I pondered on getting a crowbar and using brute force, but my boss was against it, saying that more damage might be done to the wood. I left the drawer as it was, vulnerable to attacks from petty thieves and food-mongers. For sure, there would be no one else to blame but me, and my boss boarding a flight to Tokyo the next morning, there was to be no witness to the non-crime. crap.