A friend of mine told a story of a time his flight to a foreign country was delayed by several hours, and the flight finally arrived shortly before the airport closed for the night. He retrieved his bags from the baggage carousel and waited for his hosts to come pick him up.
While he waited, the closing time of the airport passed. He was the only person left in the airport, except for a janitor who was busy mopping the floor.
And then there was a commotion at the other end of the baggage claim. A team of police with their weapons drawn scurried into the building, hiding behind walls and other structures, as if they were searching for an armed intruder.
My friend was rather worried at this display of force and wondered what was going on.
Then he looked over at the janitor. The janitor continued to mop the floor, unphased by the hubbub surrounding him.
My friend breathed a sigh of relief. The fact that the janitor remained unperturbed told him that this was probably some sort of training exercise that the police did every night after closing, or at least frequently enough that the janitor knew that it was nothing to be concerned about.
There's a lot you can learn from janitors ;) Here's a story for you that my dad shared with me:
-=-=
Once upon a time, a man was looking for a job. He reads about a janitor position in Microsoft Corporation.
He applies and soon enough he lands an interview. The interviewer starts asking the man some questions and then notices that the man forgot to fill in his email address.
The interviewer: “Oh, it...
I wonder why the janitors keep mopping the floor as the police rush in. Shouldn’t he stop until the police finished whatever they need to do?
They probably need to mob the floor again after the police rush out the building.
That’s why he starts mopping at the opposite end of the building from where the police do their exercises. (Or maybe he asks the police to use clean shoes.) I didn’t ask for details on the relative positions of the janitor, my friend, and the police.
Friend’s reaction: “my theory is the armed intruder was posing as a janitor, effectively fooling everyone.”
This is also the first theory that came into my mind…
Nah, the mild mannered janitor is hong kong phooey.
Could be
What if the janitor isn’t skilled enough to tell the difference between the regular training sessions and an actual incident? He will be right more often, but when he is wrong then it could go very wrong
If you’re going to be an armed intruder, make sure to do it at exactly 1am in the baggage claim where there is guaranteed to be a group of armed police already searching for an armed intruder.
If it’s christmas and there is a guy in a dirty white vest crawling around, ignore the janitor
Typo: /unphased/unfazed/.
“Unperturbed” works too! 🙂
Maybe he is simply uninterested, but I am disinterested
Reminds me of long ago when I walked into a McDonald's in a strange part of town. The time was 12:59 AM. At exactly 1:00 we heard the LOUDEST siren we have ever heard. The walls were shaking and I had to cover my ears. Was it Aerial attack? What to do? I took my cue from the McDonald's staff which was still slowly loading french fry envelopes with french fries and desultorily pouring coffee. ...
This is common in Texas. The 1st Wednesday of every month at 1PM local every town tests their warning sirens. If you hear them go off any other time, take cover quickly; there’s a tornado near by.
I was wondering why they run tests in the middle of the night before I noticed the PM behind the 1.