The Nuts Are Running The Squirrel House

There are a great many people in the world who are notably sadistic.  Examples that come to mind are Hitler, people who torture fluffy things for money (**cough**Michael Vick**cough**) people who drive the speed limit in the left lane (why must I always be behind you?), and whoever invented the plastic wet-wipe dispensers that practically sever your finger if you stick it in to go after the end of a wet wipe that fell back down into the can (luckily, it was my index finger, not my driving finger).

Well, there’s another person to add to the list: the person who convinced the world it would be a good idea to put fire extinguishers behind the the “in case of fire, break” glass.  Oh, I’m sure Mr. Hide-the-Extinguisher sounded convincing: “See, that way the extinguishers can’t be tampered with, and we’ll put this little hammer here so it’s really easy to break the glass.”  But inside, he knew what pain and suffering lay in store.  And he smiled.

I imagine Mr. Hide-the-Extinguisher had experienced a long career in customer service before the creation of his invention…a veritable lifetime of dumb questions, crazy people, and watching his opinion of humankind slip…until something snapped, his soul dissolved, and he decided that it would be fun to spend the rest of his life thinking up ways to punish humanity for their stupidity and insolence.  (Incidently, I’ve never had any of those urges…)

And so, he came up with the idea of hiding the fire extinguisher - the one immediate weapon we have against fire -  behind a plate of glass, so that in a moment of dire need, in the face of death by a roaring inferno, this might be the last scene to play out:

****

Employee 1: Crap!  I forwarded so many friendship emails with pictures of cute kittens, that my computer exploded.  My desk is on fire!
Employee 2: Quick, let’s go find the fire extinguisher!
**They run to the place in the wall below the red arrow that says “Fire Extinguisher”.**
Employee 1: Crap!  It’s behind glass!
Employee 2: We’ll have to break it.
Employee 1: There’s no hammer!
Employee 2: Well, then, it’s probably thin enough to break with a fist.
**Employee 2 punches at the plate of glass.  His fist fails to break the glass, but succeeds in bouncing off the plate, hitting his own face, and knocking him out cold.**
Employee 1: Crap!
Employee 3: Quick!  Someone’s desk is on fire!  Grab the extinguisher!
Employee 1: We were trying, but we can’t get through the glass!  There’s no hammer, and it’s too thick to punch through! 
Employee 3: Here.  I’ll break the glass with my large metal stapler.  I carry it around for just such emergencies.
**Employee 3 smashes glass, then reaches in to grab the extinguisher.**
Employee 3: Ah!  I’ve cut myself on all this jagged glass!  I’m losing blood…not clotting….can’t see…..**passes out**
Employee 1: Crap!
Employee 4: There’s a fire!  Someone get the extingui…**Sees passed-out bloody employees**  …Oh, gosh, blood…
**Employee 4 passes out.**
Employee 1: Seriously, what kind of human-hating, sadistic maniac would make it this hard to get to a fire extinguisher?
**Employee 1 is overcome by smoke from the flames, and passes out, as is the trend.**

-Later-

Fire Inspector: Well, Joe, good job on putting the fire out. 
Joe, the Fire Chief: Actually, we didn’t do anything.  The vending machine guy, Doug, saw the fire and peed it out.  Good ol’ Doug.
Fire Inspector: Yeah, Doug’s fun at parties.  Hey, what do we have here?
Joe, the Fire Chief: Same as all the others - a large pile of bleeding, passed out people in front of the fire extinguisher.
Fire Inspector: Maybe we shouldn’t have listened to that guy who told us to put the extinguishers behind glass.  Come to think of it, he was one sadistic son of a gun.  Great at parties, though.

****

So there.  Add the fire-extinguisher-behind-the-glass guy to your list of sadistic people.  Oh, and also to the list of people who are fun at parties.
 

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 25th, 2007 at 3:48 pm and is filed under Have A Laugh. You can follow responses to this entry through the Comments RSS Feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your site.