Elevator people – Part deux

Continuing the chronicling of my findings from part 1, here are some more elevator people:

The button pusher
Deep in his heart, he believes that elevators, as useful as they are, are an utter waste of time. Think about it. There could be a million other places you would rather be than stuck in a elevator waiting for the doors to open and let you out. This is exactly his thinking. He, though, does recognize that in spite of it being an irritant, he needs the elevator more than the elevator needs him. In this way, he develops a deep-lying mistrust that he carries with him to his grave. Every time he enters the elevator, he feels the elevator sneer at him mockingly and he vows to one day, get the better of it. Secretly, one such button pusher somewhere in the world is busy inventing a door-less elevator that is not really an elevator at all. There is no door at all, neither is there an elevator. What there is, only he knows.

This species resemble rather disheveled individuals who resign themselves to their fate. Yet, they do not, however, go down without a fight. In order to inflict maximum damage on his tyrant, he makes sure that he presses the elevator buttons at every possible opportunity. The button that most incurs his wrath is the ‘close door’ button. Somehow, he feels that one simple press of the button does not do the trick and hence carries on pressing the button until the door actually closes. Satisfied with his handiwork, he looks at the elevator condescendingly and smirks. The frequency of the button presses varies with his mood. The unit generally employed to measure his level of irritation is Presses Per Second or PPS. The PPS levels range from 2 (mildly irritated) to 274 (extremely agitated, possibly homicidal).

The phone folk
These are the technology-savvy lot. The moment they get into an elevator, an invisible switch flips in their head and out pops the phone. Now, this phone could be the most basic of phones, say a Nokia 1100 or an extremely high-end-12 megapixel-HD touch screen-2GHZ dual core processor-1GB RAM one. Whatever the phone may be, the purpose it serves is the same. In the hands of the phone folk in an elevator, a cell phone is nothing much more than a glorified clock. Research shows that more than 90% of the time, the singular usage of the phone on the elevator is to look at the time. The other 10% is to wipe the phone clean. Never mind that it was resting peacefully in the pocket where there was no dust that gathered. It must be given a wipe-down. This is the law of the elevator for these folk.

Research also points out that more than 90% of the phone folk who whip out their phones to look at the time wear a watch. Turning the wrist to point toward your face is deemed to be more tiring and effort-taking than reaching into the pocket, turning on the phone, unlocking it and then looking at the time. These phone folk are also affected by peer pressure. They see a person wielding a phone and in their minds, they are possessed. ‘Thou shalt look at your phone’, dictates the dictum.

A sub-species of the phone folk are the Blackberry boys. These are the “official” folk who, somehow, must take out their blackberry from their hip holster and wield it. They must do it. They just must. For the sake of mankind. They will get no new email or message. Yet, for posterity sake, they must clutch the berry. They will re-read mails, they will delete mails, they may even mark mails as unread but they will do something. There is a sense of outcast-ness, really, in the blackberry boys. They consider themselves superior to the other phone-folk, simply because they possess the berry. In turn, the other folk ostracize them and tend to flock and socialize amongst themselves before interacting with the berry boys. The feature that sets all phone folk out (berries or no berries) from the rest of the elevator people is their utter ridiculousness. After all, more often than not, there is no network coverage in the elevator, rendering their main weapon, the phone useless for the purpose that its name suggests.

The courtesy people and the last minuters
The courtesy people and the last minuters form a deadly duo. One that can be quite annoying and more importantly, disastrous, if you are looking at getting to work on time. The first half of this duo, the courtesy people are those wonderful, good-hearted human beings who are very very nice. They are, in fact, so nice that they end up pissing you off. They get into the elevator, look to see if the button of the floor they want to go to is pressed, if it is not, presses it but unlike the other elevator folk does not return to his base station. No. Not these folk. They take the role of the good Samaritan to a whole new level. He positions himself so that he gets a clear view of the lobby outside the door and waits, all the while making sure that he is within touching distance of the ‘open door’ button. He waits. And waits. And waits until the door begins to close. It is at this point in time that he springs into action. His senses get heightened and his spidey-sense kicks in. He looks to see if someone is trying to reach the elevator just as the door closes. If he senses that there is indeed some such person, he displays wonderfully quick reactions and makes sure that he presses the button and opens the door for the late-comer. In extreme cases, they put life and limb on the line by hurling themselves or their their body parts (usually their arms) at the closing door and ensuring that it doesn’t close.

The other half of the deadly duo: The last minuter. This person is just like that guy in the disaster movie who is the last man off the sinking ship or the last to escape a burning building, who almost makes it but inevitably ends up dying. Unlike that chap in the movie, however, this guy has a secret weapon to avoid death. His partner in crime: The courtesy guy. The last minuter has this super-power: to be just on time. Well, in actual fact, he is late for the elevator but somehow, the courtesy guy makes sure that the last minuter is on time. In elevator parlance, the time of reference is the time the elevator door starts to close but for this dynamic duo, the time of reference is the time that they can no longer see that last sliver of light as the elevator door completely closes. Chances are that, when the pair of them operate in tandem, you are going to have to spend a few extra moments in the elevator.

The Look-downers
This peculiar species are great admirers of Sir Isaac Newton. They worship gravity. As soon as they get into the elevator, they take a quick look to see if the button for their floor is pressed (if it is not, they do the needful), take up their station in the elevator and then perform the only item in their single point agenda : Look down. It’s not like they are shy; some of them genuinely are but then they are only acting in accordance with the gravity balancing theory. The gravity balancing theory is the theory by which the look-downers maintain the gravity-balance of the elevator. On the upward going elevator, looking down balances the entire anti-gravity act of going up. Whereas, on the downward traveling elevator, the act of looking down merely augments the gravitational effect of Earth and keeps the Gods happy. Well, this is the belief of the look downers anyway. These folk are easily the least controversial and most often ignored of all the species.

Well, there you have it; a few of the elevator folk that you’re likely to encounter in the life of ups and downs. So the next time you’re in an elevator, look out for these species and yes, Bon Voyage!