Mar
27
Knowledge is fear
Filed Under my life
People who are blissfully unaware of the constant danger they’re in
People who have been educated into fear
So I’m going to let you all in on a little secret today. I’m a huge dork. Big nerd. Yes, me.
Last night, I went to see a great show (Cut Copy) at a Masquerade, a venue here in Atlanta that is far less gay than it sounds. It’s actually an old factory/warehouse where many people undoubtedly lost their limbs in the very threatening looking mess of gears and rope that apparently used to do something. The building is old, very cool looking, but old.
So when a group like Cut Copy gets a crowd of a few hundred people jumping up and down in unison, the building – which is old, by the way – feels the stress, which was communicated back to me last night by the floor in front of the stage flexing no less than 4-5 inches underfoot.
The average person may say, “Wow, that’s really weird.” To someone like me who took engineering classes in college, it says, “We are about to die.”
Here’s a look into my head, in the middle of a very good show:
Because my mouse drawing isn’t too good, that is me, mentally back in engineering class trying to solve for how much weight you can put on a beam before it breaks and we all die.
I found that a couple of beers could wash the engineering classes away, so I pursued that avenue. Seemed to me that if someone nearby had known that I was having my own private Statics class in my head in the middle of this concert, they would have slapped me, and rightfully so.
I can imagine that lots of people go through this all the time: airplane engineers know all the things that can bring a plane down, train engineers know that we’re riding on 2 inches of faith, drug scientists know that if one molecule goes wrong in the batch of Advil, 100,000 people will probably die, trampoline engineers know that they’re probably going to kill a few children with their miscalculations – but consider it all worth it for those times when a cheerleader hops on for a try.
So where in your life do you know enough to be scared shitless?
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7 Responses to “Knowledge is fear”
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I think every moment in my life could wind up being an incident in a Final Destination movie…
My thought when I see a show upstairs at the Masquerade is to stand near the wall b/c when the floor caves in & you fall through, you’ll most likely break your fall with the pile of sweaty bodies who were in the center of the floor & you’ll literally come out on top.
Yes, I actually strategized this in my head when we saw Dropkick Murphys there last year.
Yeah, I had a similar reaction: I kept standing closer and closer to one of the columns, thinking that the floor must be attached to it in some 1907 engineering way. As the beer flowed, though, I migrated back to the middle of the floor. It felt like I was going down a funnel
It’s even scarier seeing a show downstairs when there is also a show upstairs & you can look up & see the floor caving in above you.
You know maybe 7-8 years ago the stairs collapsed & injured a bunch of people.
I would decidedly enjoy making so much fun of you right now for being a total freak but…as much as it hurts my soul…really, really pains me to say it…THE MASQUERADE SCARES THE SHIT OUT OF ME FOR THE SAME REASONS! I think of the Madrid Real Soccer game several years ago when a bunch of kids got so excited at the winning goal they all jumped up and down to celebrate and the bleacher gave way and most of them died. Seriously, I think about this when I think of the Masquerade. Too many drunk Evans jumping up and down at the same time at that venue = large disaster. Also, if you know anything about Atlanta, and Evan doesn’t, you would know that particular location was built over a natural spring (hence all the flooding over there) and so the land is not solid. So it is possible that the mosh pit at the Masquerade could end up in a sink hole. I am not an alarmist and I am also not suggesting that you folks walk around with a life helmet or anything…I’m just sayin’…
For those of you who don’t know Kate, she’s starting her own blog right here in the comments section.
Kate always feels the need to be at least 8% mean to me in all conversations, which is a ratio I can see we didn’t have to go without this time.
I know plenty about Atlanta, Kate. Did you know that the Aramore was built on a huge dinosaur graveyard? Yeah, thought so.
my kids just love to jump around on trampolines and they are sort of addicted to it.`.’