Confirmed: Eleri does *not* enjoy being trapped in lifts
I was fairly certain I was scared of heights and I know I am nervous of small spaces. I put this down to… hmmmm, no, no idea. Anyone? I do remember being bundled in a duvet by Laurence and a couple of his friends in Korea (I can’t quite remember why, but I am sure it seemed like a good idea at the time) and giggling like mad til I couldn’t breathe properly, but apart from that, just generally not good with confined spaces.
So today it all started quite well with excellent waking up and breakfasting and getting ready and going into work. Then the plans changed and I was to head to Canberra this afternoon instead of tomorrow morning, and so I raced back home to throw a few things in a bag (probably not the things I *actually* needed, but hey) only to discover half-way home I had left my keys in the office. Much scrambling ensued to jump off the tram and head back to the office only to get in the loft with 4 complete strangers and promptly discover that the lift was flatly refusing to do a thing.
The lifts in the Hertz building are, let’s be honest, not the most fabulous in the world at the best of times. We should remember that it has taken (at the last count) 2 months to completely renovate one of the lifts. (In fact, I seem to recall the sign on the lift said something about the escalator [Ed. ?!) being out of service for improvements.) There are three lifts, so we live in hope that they will all be suitably improved (and perhaps turned into escalators?) by Christmas 2006. In all three lifts, and particularly Lift 1 (the one furthest from the main entry door and closest to the bizarre enormous and disfiguring mirror), which it has often been necessary to encourage into closing its doors by leaning hard on one door with both hands and pushing, whilst also using one foot to push the other door away from it, as if you were Samson holding the pillars away from each other and preventing them from collapsing, although perhaps with more jerky movements and tutting.
The renovations to the lifts leave a little something to be desired. Hitherto a boring and grey design, with mirrors on the walls from waist height, and a bar (for no reason I can discover unless it be to perch on whilst waiting for the lift to take you at snail’s pace to your level) and generally gloomy lighting as though you needed nothing to entertain you whilst in a lift (after all, lifts are simply Between places, taking you from where you’ve been to your next important destination in a very Woods from The Magician’s Nephew sort of a way, except less calming and with fewer pools). Lift 1 is now a boring elegy in browns with these tall and narrow mirrors in each of the four corners in just the wrong places so you can’t check your hair when it’s a windy day, and certainly can’t touch up your lippie. Indeed, the back wall is perhaps slightly more interesting in that it is horizontal and very narrow stripes in shades of brown which look like corduroy, although sadly they are not touchy-feely.
Anyway, Lift 1 declined to move. All was fine and dandy (apart from the minor oh god, do you think I will make the flight? moment and chuckle with the peeps in the lift). Until the Fine Company decided it would be an excellent plan to discuss all the most horrifying lift stories they had ever encountered, and how they thought it would be hours until we were released.
Commence extreme sensitivity to heat (had to discard scarf and jacket and did mad pacing and circling like a trapped animal) and complete failure to be able to breathe from Eleri and a rather terse “Would you all please just stop: you are not helping”.
Commence rather bewildered rabbit-in –headlight startled and pitying looks from all Lift Buddies. And silence, thank god.
Although all I could then hear was my crazed breathing, which I had to regulate by closing my eyes and doing breathing more out than in, and pretending I was breathing into a paper bag like you do with asthma (I think) and desperately trying not to think about frantically trying to prise open the doors with only my bare hands.
Well, the lift eventually moved and I think I scared my Lift Buddies suitably, so all was well. I think we were trapped for maybe 10 minutes, although it felt like about 4 hours. I am fairly certain now that I am not the calm, controlled and measured person I thought I was, but am in fact closer to the scared and panicked hysterical woman you always see in films tearing their hair out and screaming and needing a slap (as glasses of water are hard to come by in stuck lifts).
Beks said at least there wasn’t a pregnant lady in the lift who went into labour. Mind you, she also then said that she had a dream about my boyfriend last night in which he was knitting a pashmina. Which is possibly more likely.
Anyway, I am now safely ensconced in a hotel in Canberra (the hotel has no lifts that I have seen) and am trying to work out a way for the Hertz building to change its structure and policy so I can use the stairs. Goodness, it’s only 3 flights up, so I could make it! Unfortunately, the doors to the lifts are fire escape doors, so if you use them you set of a fire alarm. Very bad if you are trying to get exercise and do more steps.
Sam said at least there was no-one jumping up and down in the lift at the time, and then promptly told me about the time she was stuck in a lift when this happened and that at the same time there were people in the lift farting and it was so revolting she had to lie on the floor to get fresh air!
See, feeling better already – mental note: take Whoopee Cushion into lifts at all times.
Currently taking bets on whether the remaining two lifts will have been completed by Christmas.
So today it all started quite well with excellent waking up and breakfasting and getting ready and going into work. Then the plans changed and I was to head to Canberra this afternoon instead of tomorrow morning, and so I raced back home to throw a few things in a bag (probably not the things I *actually* needed, but hey) only to discover half-way home I had left my keys in the office. Much scrambling ensued to jump off the tram and head back to the office only to get in the loft with 4 complete strangers and promptly discover that the lift was flatly refusing to do a thing.
The lifts in the Hertz building are, let’s be honest, not the most fabulous in the world at the best of times. We should remember that it has taken (at the last count) 2 months to completely renovate one of the lifts. (In fact, I seem to recall the sign on the lift said something about the escalator [Ed. ?!) being out of service for improvements.) There are three lifts, so we live in hope that they will all be suitably improved (and perhaps turned into escalators?) by Christmas 2006. In all three lifts, and particularly Lift 1 (the one furthest from the main entry door and closest to the bizarre enormous and disfiguring mirror), which it has often been necessary to encourage into closing its doors by leaning hard on one door with both hands and pushing, whilst also using one foot to push the other door away from it, as if you were Samson holding the pillars away from each other and preventing them from collapsing, although perhaps with more jerky movements and tutting.
The renovations to the lifts leave a little something to be desired. Hitherto a boring and grey design, with mirrors on the walls from waist height, and a bar (for no reason I can discover unless it be to perch on whilst waiting for the lift to take you at snail’s pace to your level) and generally gloomy lighting as though you needed nothing to entertain you whilst in a lift (after all, lifts are simply Between places, taking you from where you’ve been to your next important destination in a very Woods from The Magician’s Nephew sort of a way, except less calming and with fewer pools). Lift 1 is now a boring elegy in browns with these tall and narrow mirrors in each of the four corners in just the wrong places so you can’t check your hair when it’s a windy day, and certainly can’t touch up your lippie. Indeed, the back wall is perhaps slightly more interesting in that it is horizontal and very narrow stripes in shades of brown which look like corduroy, although sadly they are not touchy-feely.
Anyway, Lift 1 declined to move. All was fine and dandy (apart from the minor oh god, do you think I will make the flight? moment and chuckle with the peeps in the lift). Until the Fine Company decided it would be an excellent plan to discuss all the most horrifying lift stories they had ever encountered, and how they thought it would be hours until we were released.
Commence extreme sensitivity to heat (had to discard scarf and jacket and did mad pacing and circling like a trapped animal) and complete failure to be able to breathe from Eleri and a rather terse “Would you all please just stop: you are not helping”.
Commence rather bewildered rabbit-in –headlight startled and pitying looks from all Lift Buddies. And silence, thank god.
Although all I could then hear was my crazed breathing, which I had to regulate by closing my eyes and doing breathing more out than in, and pretending I was breathing into a paper bag like you do with asthma (I think) and desperately trying not to think about frantically trying to prise open the doors with only my bare hands.
Well, the lift eventually moved and I think I scared my Lift Buddies suitably, so all was well. I think we were trapped for maybe 10 minutes, although it felt like about 4 hours. I am fairly certain now that I am not the calm, controlled and measured person I thought I was, but am in fact closer to the scared and panicked hysterical woman you always see in films tearing their hair out and screaming and needing a slap (as glasses of water are hard to come by in stuck lifts).
Beks said at least there wasn’t a pregnant lady in the lift who went into labour. Mind you, she also then said that she had a dream about my boyfriend last night in which he was knitting a pashmina. Which is possibly more likely.
Anyway, I am now safely ensconced in a hotel in Canberra (the hotel has no lifts that I have seen) and am trying to work out a way for the Hertz building to change its structure and policy so I can use the stairs. Goodness, it’s only 3 flights up, so I could make it! Unfortunately, the doors to the lifts are fire escape doors, so if you use them you set of a fire alarm. Very bad if you are trying to get exercise and do more steps.
Sam said at least there was no-one jumping up and down in the lift at the time, and then promptly told me about the time she was stuck in a lift when this happened and that at the same time there were people in the lift farting and it was so revolting she had to lie on the floor to get fresh air!
See, feeling better already – mental note: take Whoopee Cushion into lifts at all times.
Currently taking bets on whether the remaining two lifts will have been completed by Christmas.
posted by Princess Eleri at 9:24 am
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