Water Cooler Olympics

What's that? You're not familiar with water cooler olympics?

Meet Co-worker Joe. Co-worker Joe laughs like Eddie from Friends. Chandler's crazy roommate Eddie.

Joe informed me that putting the giant water bottle into the water cooler was really hard. I says, "Joe, who are you kidding? What are you, weak? It can't be that hard. Next time the water runs out I want to try."

Well that time came upon us Friday. I went to get my mid-morning tea and the water cooler was empty. I says, "Joe! I'm gonna change the water!"

Joe comes a runnin' just in time to see my first attempt.

It turns out the problem isn't so much the weight of the bottle but the angle at which it must be dumped. All you office-types are thinking I'm crazy and that it's easy but clearly you haven't seen this water cooler.

It is behemoth. It has cords going into it and coming out of it. It has child-safety locks. And it is impossible to fill.

I thought if I filled it partially then I could just heave the top over when it was lighter. But the reservoir only holds so much water and not enough to make the bottle any lighter.

I got scared. I says, "Joe, I can't do it I'm scared."

The rest of the office came into the kitchen and gathered round to watch. I says, "I'm scared! I refuse!"

It was like the trust fall they tried to force me to do at summer camp in eighth. Then they were asking me to turn around and fall backwards off a boulder with hopes that I'd be caught. Yeah right.

"It's too hard. I'll make a mess. There will be water everywhere!"

They told me they'd help me clean it up but that I just needed to do it. I was scared. I don't know exactly what my fear was rooted in. It could have been failure, it could have been the chance that I might damage all those cords, it could have been knowing for sure that I wouldn't be able to successfully pull it off (or put in on, as the case is here).

Joe made me do it.

After ten minutes of deliberations, I got the bottle on the cooler, water got pretty much everywhere, and everyone, including Chandler's crazy roommate, had a good laugh. Then we all cleaned it up with quilted paper napkins. I think I could maybe go back to that boulder now and try the trust fall again.

But we're definitely making someone new put the the next one on.