Today

I learned two things today:

1) Without identity and money, I don't know what to do to survive. So I better not lose both at the same time.
2) I take air-conditioned working environment for granted. I should appreciate it as a privilege.

Here is what happened today:

I received a phone call from boss asking us to walk Radar. So H and I took him out around 1:20pm. On the elevator ride down, I noticed loud noise in the elevator shaft, thinking it was a noisy fan blowing. Outside, we saw a campus cop parked his car on the walkway, and went into our building. Maybe the crazy postdoc came back again, I thought.

Radar's walk was as usual. He didn't really listen to us. He went to help in a volleyball game. He sat beside people eating lunch, begging while looking cute. He smelled grass, rolled on it, and ate some, too.

We came back to find that we were having a fire drill. In fact, the basement and the sub-basement were flooded (that was the noise!). It was impossible to know how long it would take to fix it. No one was allowed to go in. We returned Radar to his mom. Now what could I do? I had no wallet on me. I had no money to buy lunch, no ID to exit the parking garage with. Luckily I had friends to borrow money from, which saved me from starving to death.

After my lunch we were told it would be another half an hour before we had any idea when we can go back. Having nothing to do, I headed to the library and read the latest People magazine, which was full of good gossips. Coming back there was another 10 minutes' wait. Finally two hours after the drill, we were allowed to go back, but the elevators wouldn't work, and the AC was off. The temperature inside was 82F (78F outside), and the air stuffy. It was the first time I preferred to work in the cold room.

So today I realized how much I depend on modern life. I really shouldn't complain. I am very privileged already.