(I work for a call center that sends utility companies to mark where their public underground lines are, so that people can dig and not hit gas lines. We have to get the information about the place where callers are digging, naturally, so that we can pass on that info.)

Me: “What is the address or street name where you’ll be digging?”

Caller: “Why do you need that?”

Me: “I’m sorry?”

Caller: “I said, why do you need my address?”

Me: “I need the address where you want the utility companies to mark their lines.”

Caller: “You don’t need to know that. You’re not the one marking the lines, are you?”

Me: “Um…”

Caller: “Are you?”

Me: “No, but I need it so I can give it to the utility companies so that they know where to go.”

Caller: “You don’t need my address, then. The utility people are the ones who need it, right?”

Me: *at a complete loss for words*

Caller: “Screw this. I’m not giving you my private information. I just need them to mark my lines.” *hangs up*

(I wonder how that worked out for him.)

My teacher for Intro to Bioscience Technologies has scheduled a field trip to Genentech for his two classes in December, which my class is very excited about. But on the week of the field trip, the teacher finds out there’s only space for 40 students. He decides to let the other class period go, and reschedules mine.

Fast forward two months. The field trip is finally happening. The morning of, I wake up and look outside to see several inches of snow and ice. School ends up being cancelled, and the field trip is again rescheduled.

A month later, it’s March, and the teacher looks up the weather forecast. The weather has been perfectly pleasant for months, so we’re not really worried, even though there’s a chance of snow on Friday.

Friday morning, I wake up and see… snow. Lots of it. I check the school website, and it’s not cancelled. I live in a rural area at a high elevation, so I often get snow when most students don’t, so I have to miss school… again… on the third rescheduling of the field trip I was looking forward to. The class goes without me.

I think the universe really didn’t want me to have that field trip.

(I’m in Spanish class, and my teacher is having us form words into grammatically correct Spanish sentences.)

Teacher: *pointing to some words with a picture of a girl blowing bubbles with a bubble wand* “This sentence should translate to, ‘She blows them.'”

I volunteer in the gift shop of a local hospital. One day a phlebotomist comes in to purchase a gift.

She’s carrying a tote filled with all her supplies, like needles, empty vials, etc. She tells me she’s very late in getting this gift and she needs to find something right away because she’ll be seeing the recipient in a few hours. I help her find an appropriate item. Then, because she’s going to be giving the gift that day right after work, I offer to put it into a nice bag with tissue. I tie some ribbon to the handle to make it more festive, and give her a free gift card to enclose.

She’s thanking me profusely for my wrapping job and then says, in all sincerity, “You’re such a lifesaver.” I look over to her tote and reply, “Umm, I think, literally, you are.”

Made me laugh to myself the rest of my shift at the irony of the fact that I volunteer in a hospital and I’m the lifesaver.

(We live in a two-level house, where one level is basement-level and the other is ground-level. Our bedroom is in the basement level, with the living room directly over it. One night, my husband is staying up watching a movie, and I’ve decided to go to bed. Right before falling asleep, I remember that I made fresh hummus and he put it in the freezer to chill a few hours before. Worried that it may be frozen, I send him a message.)

Me: “HUMMUS! It must be saved from the ice caves of Fridge Island, or it shall be doomed to never be cherished and savored again. That would be a loss for us all.”

(I count twenty seconds between sending the message and hearing him jump from the couch above me, jog to the kitchen, rip open a bag of chips, and get the hummus from the freezer. Ten minutes later I hear him sit back down. I get a message back.)

Husband: “This… This is what marriage is about.”