Lift

I've been thinking of having a mental breakdown. Seems like a nice time of year for it. My great grandfather had one, of course he was in Micanopy at the time. Preaching. Leading a prayer meeting when his young son burst in, announcing he'd found a nest of baby rattlesnakes. It just wasn't that kind of church.

Tina Fey's got nothing on me. She makes 30 ROCK look like 3RD ROCK. And really, Alec Baldwin and John Lithgow could be interchangeable. With Denny Crane. "I was once a spaceship captain!" William Shatner exclaimed in realistic clarity on an episode of BOSTON LEGAL.

All elevators in the state of Florida are inspected in August. Signed by the Governor, the updated certificate has to be displayed in public view for its users, same as a Certificate of Occupancy—something the fire marshal can easily find when he doesn't want to fill out paperwork.

I worked for a boss who managed to disconnect the emergency telephone in the service elevator. He did it inadvertently. Nearly. In an effort to make gains toward greater economic efficiency, he was reviewing the phone bill, trying to cut unused lines. To be honest, I didn't know what that number was for either. My boss picked up his phone and dialed the number. One of the employees answered.

"Where are you?" my boss said.

"I'm in the elevator, sir."

My boss looked at me.

"You can't cut that line," I told him.

"Couldn't we group it as one of the roll-over lines?"

No.

The slowest elevator is in Sanford, Florida. It is laughably slow. I had to visit a trophy shop on the second floor. The building only has two floors. When I called the trophy shop to ask for directions, they warned me that a ride on the elevator was well worth the wait. It was comically inconceivable that any piece of modern equipment could move so recklessly lacking in speed. I thought I was in a dumb waiter, the emphasis here being on DUMB. I could have walked up and down the stairs twice and still beat this elevator to top. Yes, I was smiling when the door opened. "See, didn't we tell you?" said the man behind the counter.

You endure by enduring, but in an elevator, you have a choice of going up or down. Taking the elevator is the very process of elevating, or alleviating, if you double the “l” and change the vowels. I figure I'm in the subbasement now, so there's really no other way but up.