Off the Lolameter

I have a coworker, let's call her "Lola," who says that if the elevator comes right away, you are going to have a good day while if you just miss it, you are going to have a bad day. So we always talk about what kind of day we are going to have on the Lolameter (pronounced lo-LA-mitter, not Lola-meter). For example, Monday morning our bus drove right by us! This was all the more surprising because, even if it were a new driver or a sub, surely he or she should have noticed not only the large number of people waiting at the bus stop, but also the large bus stop structure. I could see missing one person at one of those subtle little bus stop signs, but ten at a stop with a structure? Come on, you obviously need more coffee. So that would indicate on the Lolameter that I was not going to have a good day, but I don't remember the rest of it being particularly bad.

Then yesterday morning everything seemed to be going smoothly until I was halfway to the bus stop and realized that, when I had switched over from my summer bag to my winter bag, I had neglected to transfer one little item: my bus pass. A neighbor offered to let me use a ride on her ten-ride pass, and usually I would have taken her up on the offer and just walked home (or begged a coworker for a ride, if the weather turned really bad), but I had to go downtown to run some errands and HAD to take the bus because on Saturday - clearly a bad day on the Lolameter - I somehow misplaced my car key and have yet to locate it. (On MyFace my status is currently: "Livin' car-free.... cuz I lost the key!") So I had to go back and get the pass and was then late to work AGAIN, but the rest of the day was fine.

Today Lola came into my office and said how not one, but two elevators had been RIGHT THERE when she needed them so it was clearly going to be a good day. I told her how this morning I'd been waiting for the bus and two teenage boys were trying to flirt with me and the woman standing next to me, showing off and looking to see if we'd noticed. Since I could literally have given birth to these children, I found it mostly amusing and a little bemusing. The two boys were black, I am white, and the woman standing next to me (who could have been their aunt, but not quite their mother) was Chinese, so hormones know no age or race boundaries. When I told Lola (who is younger, blacker, and way more attractive than I am) that I wasn't sure if I should be flattered because maybe they thought I was younger than I am, or if I should just assume they would flirt with anything female, she wasn't sure. She said, "You have to see what the rest of the day is like because I have no idea if that means you will have a good or a bad day. Just see what happens." And you know what? It's been a kind of neutral day, not particularly good or bad. Just a day. So I guess if teenagers flirt with you at the bus stop tomorrow, that means that your day will be smack in the middle of the Lolameter.

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