art of decking the halls/building

When my boss hinted that if I wanted I could hang up Christmas lights on our building, I thought, yeah RIGHT. Maybe if you pay me triple—even then, I’d only consider it.

My internal dialog dubbed over his explanations; his mouth formed: "extension cords," "ladders," and "climb on roof," "blah blah," as my mind acknowledged that there was no way was I even doing this. I wasn't hanging lights outside, or using a rickety ladder—I’ve never even used a ladder before. I was not the person for the job.

“You’ve never used a ladder?” my mother later laughed, in disbelief. I noted that she didn’t give me any helpful advice, or stern warnings for the morrow, and talking to her made me realize that somehow, I was suddenly.... doing it.

My boss must have mind-controlled me, and by holly, I was now Decorator-in-Charge.


I was a little nervous. Are ladders even safe? I had only experienced ladders in Calculus and other math problems. Ladders in math problems tend to dump people/things off of them at calculable velocities and distances. So how was this going to turn out?

But then, there I was--I examined the situation, the ground space and existing shrubbery, the roof where I would lean my ladder, the lumber yard full of gawkers across the street...

NO--Focus.
Switch mind off. Side jump up porch railing to ladder over shrub. Tunnel vision. Don't look down. Don't look at the view. Don't listen to cars driving past. Grab wire, pop in hooks.

Done with Side One. I climbed down.

And realized that my ladder was stuck in the bushes. Stupid, stupid bushes.

If any of those lumber yard gawkers were asking themselves why I was taking so darn long, and why I was yelling, they might have considered HELPING ME, which is something I actually screamed at them (in my mind) in one of my more frustrated moments. They were probably just taking bets at when I was going to break my leg.

Here is some ladder etiquette that I breached:

Don’t drop ladder---NO check

Don’t put ladder upside down— no check (my boss casually mentioned the ladder feet as I was positioning it. "Oh, yeah. Of course," I said--as I was thinking, ladder feet?)

Don’t walk under ladder—no check. 7 more years bad luck. I'll probably be single until I'm 35 for that one.

Don’t place ladder on top of shrubbery for a better position—no check....again. Hopefully my boss doesn't notice certain damage until spring.

And I have some pretty serious questions for ladder professionals and maybe physicists:

1) Haven't we invented some sort of arm extension with pincher on the end yet? Useful, I would think.

2) Why is it that when you stretch with one hand extended it is longer than the two handed stretch? The two handed stretch makes more sense, as there are two hands to help with the work; the one handed stretch, while longer in length, takes longer in time, because only one hand is fumbling around. It is mind boggling.

So, can you show me how to do that? No, please--no more ladders, no more lights. Wake me up in January.