I have to admit that I have a secret love of a crisis. I seem to do best when all hell is breaking loose. Not in my freakish, often out of control personal life, mind you. As we know, I can conjure up all sorts of scenarios that justify the craziest things going on in my life to the point where they seem entirely normal, at least to me.
My love of a good crisis goes back to my corporate days. I was the crisis communications manager. My responsibility would be to dream up all sorts of scenarios – a place crash where the CEO was on board, a hostage situation in an Egghead store, a robbery at the bank – and then chart responses to each of them.
It was a lot of fun. The end result was a large manual, yes, a crisis manual, that served as our roadmap for responding to any number of crises.
It was a very rewarding undertaking. I was really good at coming up with scenarios. Some of them were almost impossible, but would have had tremendous impact on our operations. Others could be considered quite common, such as a natural disaster.
So I couldn’t resist looking in the big red book on my book shelf at my new job. I had already rummaged through the disaster kits under my desk to see what was in them. It was part of an annual earthquake drill.
Ah, an earthquake. This particular scenario fascinates me for I am in a skyscraper now. Yes, I’ve been in one before, but never this high up. Walking down thirteen floors was a nightmare. Can’t imagine what it’s like now.
And that was the scenario that fascinated me the most in the book. It seems that the normal routine is to crawl under your desk as the shaking begins. Having grown up in Seattle, this is hardly a surprise. We have been taught this since grade school. Eventually, someone even wised up to this particular drill, telling us to hold onto our desk, which otherwise would be shaking its way across the room, leaving us unprotected.
Got it. Get under desk. That’s a good thing as an emergency kit is there with a whistle, a flashlight that may or may not work and a block of food that was manufactured in 1971 that is supposed to give me enough calories to live for a week, if it doesn’t shatter all my teeth first.
After the shaking stops is when things get fun. We’re supposed to rope off areas that are unsafe and stay away from them. You don’t have to convince me of this. I don’t want to fall to my death roaming too close to an edge of a part of the building that simply fell away. I saw Lorne Greene in Earthquake. I know how this works. No being lowered in an office chair to the floor below me on a fire hose. No sir-re, bob!
Everything else looked pretty good in the manual. Except #5. It said, and I paraphrase here, “In the event of an earthquake, take three plastic liners and place them in a trash can. Use this in the bathroom until it is determined that the sewer system is still in operable condition.”
First, in a major earthquake, I don’t think I will need to be using the restroom for several days. I will definitely need a dry cleaner and a mop, but no restroom. Assuming I am trapped in the building for several days, munching on that block of sawdust they call an energy bar, I do see opportunity in the midst of disaster.
Yes, my wonderful, weird brain in action. I have an advantage here. I have read the manual. I know what to do if disaster strikes without warning, as earthquakes tend to do.
I have two trash cans in my office, for reasons I cannot yet understand. I have already dedicated one of them as the earthquake can. I have three liners in the bottom, ready to answer the call, if you get my drift.
More important, I now have signage. After the earth stops shaking and the building stops wiggling like a block of Jello, I will make a mad dash to the Men’s Room. There I will set up shop. Can in hand, three liners thick.
I will already have a good supply of Toidy Tokens. A buck a piece. Sure, I could sell them for a five spot, but we’re talking about an emergency here. Why would I ever profit from the misery of others?
So there I am. Toidy Tokens at hand. To use my can, you need to just shell out a buck. If you think ahead, you can get six Toidy Tokens for $5. Yes, the sixth one if free.
Now, I know this could cause some tension on our floor. There could be some who refuse to use the luxurious accommodations I have created for their convenience. But eventually, I think they’ll come around. After all, time really is on my side in this regard.
I am, if nothing else, a patient man when it comes to serving customers. Sure, they may be reviled by my attempt to profit off their human misery. They could accuse me, saying that I was trying to piss them off and threatening to beat the crap out of me.
And I will poo-poo one and all. For I know that even in a crisis, it’s all about supply and demand. Sure, you can use the can in your office, if you still have an office. Or you can use the nice, relatively clean one I offer… for a small pittance really, particularly in an all out crisis.
Yes, they will come to love the Toidy Tokens I have so thoughtfully prepared and provided. They will realize that I am offering a valuable service. And they will be more than willing to line up, dollars in hand, all for a chance to take a little pressure off in a very stressful time.
And eventually, they will ask for some toilet paper. Toilet paper? Have I got a deal for you!
In the Emerald City, feeling a bit bound up by a sense of duty… or is that…
– Robb