Carver's Carpet

On Monday I got to work a little earlier than usual. My prize: Being the first person to discover that the third floor was flooded.  Two days later and I'm on the eighth floor in a strange cubicle surrounded by strange people.  They don't take kindly to strangers.  

Nothing like a little excitement to get the rank and file all atwitter.  I'm fond of sudden events.  I like surprises.  This distraction is okay.  Now I have to convince my coworkers that everything is going to be fine.  

I'm sure it's been studied before countless times by "top men," but soak the carpet of a city government worker's cubicle and watch the circus unfold.  I'd like to see the spreadsheets and baseline data showing the variant levels of freak-out people exhibit when they're suddenly uprooted from their routine and plopped down into the thick of stink-eyes and hand me down office chairs.  I think one woman hyperventilated.  And another went home because the wet carpet allegedly triggered an asthma attack.  

There's a reason traffic comes to a stand still when it rains.  The panic and fear of unusual occurrences turns us into stark raving lunatics.  The true nature of our character is not showcased on how we live our lives on a day to day basis, but rather how we react to a flood on the third floor.  Or how we receive bad news.  Or how we find a new path to the waterfall.