Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Hitting pause

Had a slightly frantic day at work today, not helped by a fire alarm in the middle of the morning. Just a drill, and we weren't standing outside for all that long, but somehow it threw me off. I was rather late home.

However, my dear husband had made the tea, and then did the washing up while I watched Heroes. I don't watch a lot of TV, but I've been addicted to Heroes since the beginning. It seems to provide just the right balance between mindless entertainment, humour, and the mental challenge of following the highly convoluted plot.

J does not watch Heroes, but puts up nobly with my breathless updates on this week's happenings: "Sylar learned to copy people's powers without killing them, and Elle forgave him after she shot him with a lot of lightning bolts, and Tracy seems to be going to betray Nathan to Arthur, and Flint turns out to be Claire's uncle, but he doesn't know that yet and chased her down a sewer..." Do you get this level of drama on Coronation Street? I don't think so.

My favourite character is Hiro, partly because he's almost always cheerful, and partly because he has a very cool superpower: he can stop time. (This is conveyed in an endearingly lo-fi way, by getting everyone on the set except Hiro to stand very still.)

Wouldn't we all like to stop time, sometimes? I would have had a much less hectic day if I could have hit the "pause" button for everyone except me, allowing me to catch up in peace without needing to stay late. You could tidy up on a Saturday morning and still have the day to do things in. You wouldn't ever be late for anything again.

On the whole, I look forward to the future, so I wouldn't want to hold time permanently in the same place. I'd want to know what would happen next. But when I'm busy, it would be wonderful.

For those who were wondering how I cycle to work "one way" - I perhaps didn't express this very well. I cycle along the path in the morning, then home by road if it's dark. There may be more traffic, but it's better lit (and by home-time I should have woken up enough to cope with it).

3 comments:

--V said...

I never got into Heroes, I don't know why. I like all kinds of SciFi. Maybe I was watching or doing something else that cause a scheduling conflict.

I agree, stopping time would be a very useful superpower.

Re: biking one way. I didn't even give that a thought. The buses 'round here have bike racks affixed to their grilles where you can stash your bike & ride home. I assumed that's what you meant.

Rosemary Riveter said...

I figured you meant only taking the cycle path one way, because of the possibility of it harbouring psychopaths after dark...

Pam said...

And you had another very busy day today, didn't you? You weren't home when we phoned at 7. Alas.