G means Go

I spent the better part of a minute standing in a stationary elevator today. Actually, I participate in this form of stupidity almost everyday: I get in the elevator and just stand there. I forget that I need to push the button for the floor where I'm headed.

To my credit, this happens only when I'm headed down (I am not a complete idiot). Going up is easy. The elevator is not God, it cannot tell where you're headed when you walk in an elevator of a building with 44 floors. So I always hit the floor button on my way up. (And it works every time!)

But going down is a different story. You walk in from the 42nd floor and where else are you supposed to go but down? As in down to the ground floor. Isn't that obvious? Where else would you go? The 23rd floor? What's there? Another office, that's what. Someone else's office. Why you you want to go there?

And that's why I don't hit G when I'm going down. Because I expect the elevator to be as smart as I am.

But I realize that might be unfair to the elevator. So now when I walk into an elevator I hit G. Since it stands for "Go".

And I stand in a stationary elevator each time I'm on my way up.