I’m a positive guy.
Here’s a short and incomplete list of things that I thank for giving me the challenge to maintain that positivity:

- People who check text messages in the middle of a conversation.

- Smokers who flick their filthy butts on the ground right next to a bin (or anywhere that’s not a bin in fact).

- The guy in my building who lets his dog shit in the side doorway, so I have to step over fresh dog shit every morning when trying to maneuver my 10’6″ SUP board up the back stairs.

- Lack of journalistic integrity in today’s newspapers/TV.

- After scrubbing the skiddies off of the toilet bowl, a tiny little droplet of water flicking up off of the brush and onto my lip.

- People who don’t lift the seat in Public Toilets.

- Endless, loud and crap “Shitzmix 99″ cds at the gym.

- The general acceptance of improper grammar, spelling and punctuation in sign writing, newsprint, magazines, and even supers on TV shows.

I thank all of you.

x aa

Something interesting happened on the way to the Golden Coast this morning.
As we were landing, our plane struck a small flock of ducks.
Since we were traveling at about 300km/hr coming in to land, the ducks came off second best – but not before they did damage to the plane’s undercarriage.

As a result, we were unable to taxi into the gate, and we were stuck on the tarmac for about 30 minutes.

The captain came on the PA to announce that the fire trucks we were seeing were just a precaution, and the firemen were there because we were leaking non-flammable hydraulic fluid, and not to be alarmed.

Once people saw the fire men, the whole plane’s vibe changed.

The Cabin Supervisor must have made the announcement to remain seated, buckled, with phones off yet people kept getting up and trying to go to the toilet.

There seemed to be a sudden need for the entire plane to suddenly use the toilets on board.
She kept making announcements to remain seated, and to leave your phones off, yet people kept getting up.
She explained that if we had to evacuate the plane, she needed everyone where she could see them, and that the toilets were locked on take-off and landing anyway.

After about ten minutes the hostie in the back reported via their little intercom phone that people in the back were peeing in bottles.

Now, this got me thinking.
We were certainly not in an emergency, we were in no danger at all, we were just inconvenienced.
However, because some folks felt that this was an extraordinary situation, it seems that some regularly agreed to social boundaries were up for being violated.

It was not the opening scene of Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds”, yet it was an interesting insight into how, once people believe that certain norms no longer exist, that it’s OK to behave like animals.

You hear about kids being pushed out of the way by adults trying to escape an emergency, even people pushing their friends underwater when trying to stay afloat in the sea, but this was far from anything like that.

I’d like to think that when the shit hits the fan, the things that make us human should be the things we treasure most, not the first things that we throw away.

x aa