When busy schedules collide
The other day, I read the funniest email chain between a Bi-Line journalist and someone he wanted to interview. Being Westminster students, both the interviewer and interviewee are extremely busy, and the activities continued to become more absurd as they talked. For my column, I chose to replicate their conversation below…with some hyperbole, of course.
A: Hey, would you want to be in the Bi-Line? We’d love to interview you about the new—
B: Of course! It’s always nice to have excellence appreciated rather than run roughshod over and rebranded through the whirlwind of the college application process.
A: When would you like to meet? I have practice every weekday from 3:30 to 6, then Mock Trial and Ensemble from 6:30-9 on Wednesdays and Thursdays, but I should be free on Saturday if that rainstorm that I’ve been banking on gets my soccer tournament canceled.
B: I’ll be out on Saturday, and I’ve actually had to schedule a block out of my day on Friday to cry because I don’t really have another day to do that. Sorry.
A: What about next week, say—Wednesday morning?
B: Usually, I would say yes, but I’m flying out to Kansas on Tuesday night to help revitalize a relocated Appalachian group. Thursday morning?
A: No can do. Thursdays are research days. For exercise, I bike down to Tech to contribute with this professor who is using nanotechnology to reverse the effects of racism in a general population. Friday morning I could probably sacrifice my fifth hour of sleep that I usually allow…
B: Jeez, I’m the worst. I actually wake up extra early on Friday to help construct a full replica of the Holocaust memorial in inner-city Atlanta. Yet right after school on Friday I should have time for a quick chat.
A: I’ll actually be jet-packing over to Bolivia to feed the Bolivian goats a special serum that we developed last week with antibodies to protect from that new plague that’s ravaging the Bolivian goat population. Although…yeah, I could probably swing a phone call as I’m collecting their milk for research, as long as you don’t mind a little rumbling?
B: Shoot, I just remembered I’ll be in LA, working in a writers’ room. I could probably convince them that we could use this as inspiration…could you get them to think you’re, like, really interesting?
A: I did perform an anti-balding procedure on Jeb Bush last year, but people do that kind of thing all the time.
B: Yeah…maybe something a little bit more impressive.
A: I am in the process of dissolving this regime by a warlord in the Democratic Republic of Congo…
B: Y’know what—why don’t we hold off until you do that, because I don’t think I’ll be able to convince them otherwise. What was it that you wanted to interview me about anyway?
A: A new teacher.
B: Oh, right. Well, we’ll talk then. Good luck with your article.
A: Thanks. We just found out he used to be a banker.
B: Oh, didn’t know that.
A: Me neither.
