Riding Alone

You step into the elevator to go up to whatever-floor. You're not in a mad rush or anything, but you also don't have a ton of time to spare at the moment. You go and press the button(s), and hopefully in the order I suggested last time. Then as the door is about to start closing, you hear someone jump into a quick trot for the closing doors.

What do you do?
Or perhaps better-worded,
do you do what I do?

Normally, given all of the above, I let the doors close as originally scheduled. Usually, this is because the elevator is empty, and I like riding in an empty elevator because it feels like the whole thing belongs to me: all mine!

"But that's not nice," you say. "They'll know you were just intentionally not letting them ride! And they'll have to wait for the next one. You've just wasted a lot of their time."

Ah, but I alleviate this by sometimes making for the button panel and pretending I can't press the right button in time, and as the doors close between me (the winner) and them (the not-winner), I mutter, "Oh, sorry!" Or, I give a look saying, "I tried, but I couldn't get the button in time." Usually, this turns out okay.

Yeah, I'm a bastard sometimes.

(Disclaimer: sometimes this really is the case -- sometimes I actually try to hold the elevator for them -- since not all "DOOR OPEN" buttons are placed in the same location.)

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Another side trick: if you're just walking up to the open elevator, and someone is a ways behind you, you can quicken your step in order to avoid that awkward stuff above. Just keep an eye out when you're in the lobby or the parking lot, that's all I'm saying.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of the time my sister was witness to elevator rage:

At the garage entrance to the gym, she stands in the back of a half-packed elevator. Someone is approaching the elevator, person closest to the door (buttons and all), and in the line of sight of the person, does nothing but lets the elevator door close.

Two flights up, elevator door opens and deposits them at the entrance to the gym level.

There stands the irate person who was shut out of an elevator ride. Apparently, he ran up the stairs to chew out the elevator patron, "You! You saw me approach the elevator and you didn't even bother holding the doors for me!!"

Turns out he was a trainer at the gym.

My sister was doing her best to not crack up.

I would be fearful of a miserable gym experience. ;)