Careful what you wish... #2

I moaned a bit the day before yesterday and I eventually got what I wanted. A downpour of biblical proportions came over Paris and paralyzed trains, some metro lines and... the International Controllership Department in General Electric Healthcare, Buc, France.

Yep, when I left (or rather - 'was evacuated' by the safety personnel) after having put all the cables and the PC on my desktop, there was approximately 2-3 cm of water on the floor (or rather - above the carpet). This basically means that the Q2 close may be delayed a day or two, before the maintenance staff renovates our workplaces.

So, indeed, I got what I wanted. There is a gentle breeze, and the air even smelled of ozone for a brief moment after the thunderstorm had gone away...

This case brings some light to the not very obvious phenomenon of the retaliative temper of the forces of nature. This particular predicament's causality is rather simple and straightforward - I had produced a critical mass of disrespect that started to smell unpleasantly, and triggered a sanitation system aimed at razing the premises of an infidel (yes, me) to the ground.

Some may very well say that I'm interpreting the abovementioned chain of events in a very egocentric manner, not taking into account all obvious external factors that usually add up for a hell of a thunderstorm, such as: high humidity (from evaporation), electric load build-up in the lower atmosphere (winds, quickly moving clouds) etc.

Well, guys, if you don't believe in the fact that nature is simply mean, take the butterfly effect for instance (no, not the movie, that's just some people not using contraceptives and resulting in the conception of an individual as peculiar as the Kutcher guy...).

A quick reminder for those of you who don't know: the butterfly effect is a term coming from the depths of the exotic sciences dealing with chaos, uncertainty and bureaucracy. The idea behind it states that if a butterfly flapped his wings somewhere in a god-forsaken bar in Glenrock, WY, it would probably result in a hurricane in Southeast Asia. That's the theory.

Let's take a look at the implications of the above statement. Imagine, just for a moment, that there really was a direct cause-and-effect connection between the innocent butterfly and a frenzy in Malaysia. Now let's assume that each action requires reaction (or perhaps not requires, but rather takes it for granted; try punching a policeman - or another highly reactive elements - on the stomach, for instance). Now let's assume that there are some butterflies in Kuala Lumpur and that all of the would go out of hiding after the storm is over.

You see what I mean? Yes, the Malay butterflies would take revenge and start flapping their tiny wings frantically, until the world ended in a series of violent atmospheric events.

Even though these kinds of phenomena are hopefully rare and occurred only a dozen or so times on the geologic scale of time (perhaps mainly due to the fact that the Malay butterflies hardly ever figure out what actually struck them), nevertheless this is an almost empirical proof to the decadence of nature. And perhaps to the Monty Python-like sense of humor it prefers.

This in turn leads us directly to another conclusion: if you have wings and you've mastered the art of flapping them in certain ways (with a certain frequency, angle and target), you can actually evoke some vis majors and draw the wrath of others. If we take it one step further, we can assume that not only wings, but perhaps flapping your eyelids, ears or simply tapping impatiently with your fingers (as I usually do, when I'm fed up with the weather, and what I actually did before the deludge), you can be in big trouble in an instant.

Now, as you probably are aware of the fact that most of our uttermost needs and desires are subconsciously transmitted outwards in the forms of body language, temperature, breathing pattern etc., you probably already see my point.

Main point: it seems there is a proven and working link between what you think about and what will eventually happen.

Main point (poetic approach): Careful what you wish, you just might get it...

P.S. It's just started to rain again. If I auto-weather-analyzed myself, it would probably mean that I'm not pleased with my job at all. Which is not the case. So maybe it's this shitty coffee machine that I hate so much? Or is it just wishful thinking...

[disclaimer: no butterflies were either harmed or forced to do things they find ethically questionable during the experiments conducted for the purpose of this blog entry]