Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Powerpoint

Went to a dinner meeting hosted by a group of extra-terrestrials. (Alas, that's included as part of my job description - or, to put it simply, my salary.)

The evening program was planned to be a simple one: There was an invited speaker from the States, who was supposed to share his experience in a brief presentation of half an hour; the dinner was after the talk.

The disaster began when the host forgot to bring a computer for the presentation.

They tried to borrow one from the venue (which was supposed to be a business center), but there was none for hire.

One of the hosts contacted a friend in office at a distance of a 10-minute walk, and it took half an hour before a small lap-top appeared - only to discover that it could not be logged on without an appropriate fingerprint.

Another audience appeared late and brought with him a computer - but it was an Apple and therefore not compatible.

The group of extra-terrestrials remained chaotic for an hour or so; I continued to wonder how Winston Churchill delivered his talks before Powerpoint was invented.

The dinner finally began by 9:40 PM. I left without saying goodbye as soon as I took the appetizer - so that I would not fell hypoglycemic on my way home. As Churchill once said, a gentleman is a man who would not be rude unless he intentionally does so.

PS. After we got married for over six years, Vivian had never heard so much colourful vocabulary from me.

1 comment:

JW said...

The extra-terresterials were really serious about this meeting... because I can see that they were directly organizing it without deputizing to their subordinates.