Please Stand By

I’m about to once again mock something that’s important in its own way, but it was carried out in such a convoluted, mixed-up, dumbass way that it’s perfectly mockable. Stick with me, and you’ll understand why.

At about 9:50 AM today everyone received the following e-mail: “There will be a fire drill this morning at 10:00.” A fire drill. Just like second grade. But since I suspect it has more to do with insurance policies than than promoting workplace regression to age 7, so I’ll digress for now.

Now, to help drive home the point, my employer’s building is wired with noisy emergency alarms, flashing strobe lights, and an automatic recording, which comes on every time they have one of these drills (or every time an electrician accidentally cuts the wrong wire, whichever comes first).

“May I have your attention please. May I have your attention please. We have received an alarm in the building. Please stand by.”

So at the stroke of 10:00, sure enough the strobe lights start flashing and the disco dancing begins. Okay, the strobes flash, the alarm sounds, and the recorded voice begins.

This message repeats over and over and over again for the next 5 minutes.

Yes, lady - we’re all giving you our undivided attention.
Yes, we know there’s an alarm in the building. We can hear/see it.
Yes, we’re STANDING BY.

Please Stand By. That’s the key phrase in this snark. Please Stand By. Nowhere does it say EVACUATE THE BUILDING. It just says to Please Stand By.

But being the lemmings that people here are, they caught wind that it was just a drill. "Hey – it’s a fire drill! Let’s all go stand outside in the parking lot and in a large touch of irony, light up cigarettes!"

So off they went, down the stairs and into the parking lot to smoke while the building pretended to burn.

Ah, but here’s the rub. Remember how it doesn’t say to evacuate? Remember how we live in TORNADO LAND? Remember what happened to Dorothy Gale of Kansas when she wandered a little too close to an F-5?

Yes, I know I’m being nitpicky. But the only reason these people bugged out was because of the e-mail telling them that there was going to be a fire drill. If there’d been a tornado outside and they bolted from the building, they’d all be reenacting their favorite scenes from “Twister” about now.

So I finally had to follow the crowd outside, because the geriatric security guards were chasing everyone out the door, despite the fact the grating voice still repeated “Please Stand By”. I got out to our designated spot to stand in the parking lot, watched a few people puff on Marlboros, looked up into the cloudy sky to make sure there weren’t any tornadoes, then turned around and headed back in behind everyone else.

By 10:17 it was over. Another fire drill down for a year. Feel free to please stand by during your regularly scheduled break time. Otherwise, get back to work, you scurvy dogs, you.

Lord, I really hope this place doesn’t ever have a major emergency. We’d all be crispy critters or dropped in an overturned maple tree three counties away.

And how much work would we get done then?