The Elevator Assignment.

The lift at work was broken on Sunday, so I got to stand in the freight lift for 90 minutes pushing the buttons and making sure that people didn't wander into the compactor by accident. It was a highly technical job, for which only my unique blend of qualifications, academic achievements and work experience were really suited. I stood by the door, waited for people to come into the lift and then I pressed the buttons. I make it sound easy - I made it look easy. But then that's the real gift in any difficult job - I make all of my work look effortless and breezy, whereas there is grit, stamina and a whole lot of brainwork going into my not insignificant efforts.

I was speaking to someone who trained as a hairdresser the other day (speaking to them the other day, this person spent years at hairdresser school) who told me the first rule about hairdressering is not to mention religion and politics whilst chatting to the customer. This person also told me their mother put her false nails right through the boil on an old lady's head, so I couldn't be quite sure of the provenance of this information, but it stood me in good stead for my lift banter. Rule 1: no religion or politics on the 15-second ride to the only floor people were allowed to go to. Luckily I was in the only part of this magnificent building, this cathedral of commerce, that had windows, so I could comment on the weather, sticking my head out of the lift every five minutes just to check nothing had changed.

Some happy chap, a colleague, came into the lift for a ride (clearly too lazy to take the staff stairs). "Oh, the lift. Are you enjoying yourself?"

"It's very technical," I said, waving at the number of buttons behind me.

"And boring too," he observed.

"It has its ups and downs," I noted wittily.

"...yes, literally!" he added superfluously a beat or two after it might have been funny. Yes, happy chap, literally. I thought that was a given when I said it - a double meaning, if you will. Normally this wouldn't have irritated me, but I had thought this up on the spot. Sometimes you come up with a good line and you wait ages to shoehorn it awkwardly into an exchange - if it flops, it flops, c'est la vie.

But this was a highly contextual and very funny moment. Ruined. I felt dejected as I went back up to the next floor to reload.