Laws of Nature

There are some things you can't mess with. Gravity. The ocean. The 10-minute rule.

What's that, you ask? Let me explain by way of example. Pretend it is a day when you need to leave work no later than 5 in the evening. No, lives will not be lost if you don't leave by then, but you do really really want to leave by 5. So, late in the afternoon you're feverishly wrapping up all the little to-do items that you can. It's nearly time to leave now, and you're about to hit the "Send" button on the last email of the day so you can start to pack up. And then it happens. At 10 minutes to 5 your door is darkened by someone who steps in to talk about an issue at work. He says he'll take "a minute"; instead, he stays for sixty.

It's as if someone sent a memo: "Dear colleagues of Mahogany, today he has plans for the evening. It's up to us to ruin them. Will one of you step up and be a jerk? Will one of you walk up to him at precisely 4.50pm and proceed to trap him in a rambling, frustrating, endless discussion about something that no sane person would really care about? You would? Thanks, we knew we could count on you!"

And so the trap is set.

But where there's an ocean, there is a boat. Where there is gravity, there is anti-gravity. (Don't scoff, I know for a fact that there are alien spacecraft interred in Area 51 that are powered by anti-gravity drives). And where there is a 10-minute rule, there is a 30-minute stratagem. From now on, I will plan to leave 30 minutes before the time that I plan to leave.

Let's see how long I can fool the universe.