Take That Tom Cruise

Quick, cue the Mission Impossible theme song….

It amazes me (after the fact of course) how easy they ‘they’ seem to make everything look in the movies.
Take like for example, scaling a wall and coming down the other side….who comes to mind – Tom Cruise, Catherine Zeta Jones, Ahnold, me….
Can you see where I’m going with this?

Part of my job includes being keeper of the keys….all keys.
Since these ‘said’ keys have been in disarray for numerous months before I even came on the scene to find one specific key sometimes is a monumental task. This is on my ‘to do list’ for over the Christmas break, while everyone else is on vacation. First, of course, I always try the ‘master’ key. This particular little gem works on every restricted lock assembly on the site…except, naturally, (Murphically speaking) for the door that needs to be opened.

How do you get the door open you ask?
Well, the most logical (ha-ha) would be to get the locksmith to open it…however, being a restricted access door, the process is a little more involved than just picking a lock. It involves drills and all sorts of nastiness that costs mucho dinero. What’s the alternative I ask? Well, if you get a ladder, climb up, lift the ceiling tiles, you can come down on the other side and open the door from the inside, thus negating the destruction of a $500 locking mechanism.

Sounds easy enough. Not.
Cue the theme music, I’m goin’ in!!!!
What????, you say. Are you out of your mind???? Apparently. Most certainly.

My maintenance guys are older than me, and were out making the site safe from slip and fall etc….it wasn’t the locksmith’s job to go all cloak-and-dagger. I can do this. How hard can it be? I’ve seen it done on TV…..Man, I’m a dolt, I admit it.


So I’m hangin over the door frame (not unlike the proverbial ‘sitting on the fence’) thinking “what the hell were you thinking”, that’s a pretty long way down….
But by this time, I’m kinda (more like really, really) stuck. Bite the bullet you wuss..

K, I can’t hear the theme music for the ringing in my ears and the voice in my head telling me how much this is going to hurt…
Let go, you’re like a cat, you’ll land on your feet….then I start to laugh hysterically, out of the shear ridiculousness of it all and out of fear and out of the fact that I got myself into this predicament so I really have no one to blame but myself.

Let go. Let go! Let go!!!!!
Crap, forgot to push out when I let go, so naturally (physically, as in the subject) weight drops in a straight line.
Swift.
Swift was the fall, swift was the hitting of my arms and wrists, swift was the bruising, swift was the cursing.
I think the cursing was swifter than the bruising…it was definitely more colorful….although…..

So now I’m wearing long sleeve shirts so that people won’t ask me if I’m an abused woman….

The best lessons are learned.

On the upside, the door is now unlocked, and I had it re-keyed to match my master key. Ha! Take that!