I have had some embarrassing moments in my time. There was the brief leg-warmers period after seeing Flashdance. There was the time I bought tickets to a Beatles reunion concert in rural Manitoba. One winter, I sported a Fu Manchu…

Yesterday kind-of diminished the impact of most of my other embarrassing moments.

I had to run to the store in the afternoon, so I gathered up my keys, locked up our suite, and headed over to the elevator. One of the frustrations of living in an apartment is the unreliable blasted elevator system, and the delays that it can present whenever you care to exit the building. This day, an elevator arrived surprisingly quickly…

When the doors opened, there was a rather full house inside. A family was checking out, and they were not traveling light. Every member of the family had two pieces of luggage, and each family member had an expression of “get-me-the-hell-back home” about them.

Very friendly to me however, making enough room for me to squeeze my husky frame in…

I pushed the button for the lobby, then settled into a cheerful stare at the numbers on the upper wall. Which didn’t move. Not once. I joked that maybe I was too heavy, then opened the door again, and closed it one more time. Still no movement.

It became apparent by the fourth time that maybe my addition to the elevator’s load really did trigger a safety feature of the device, paralyzing it in place until one of the rug-rats got off, along with a couple of pieces of luggage. Friendly as the family had been to that point, clearly that was not the unanimous choice. I developed a compelling feeling that I was going to be asked to leave…

I waved at them as the doors closed, and the elevator then made the trip down to the lobby, sans me. I have never overloaded an elevator before. I reflected on my trip down the flights of stairs to the lobby that I should maybe pick up some lighter clothing, while at the mall…

Chow for now!!