My Newbie is Showing...Part 3

30dbc: dictionary day

Dictionary.com's Word of the Day for Sunday was "calliopean", meaning "piercingly loud; resembling a calliope in sound". Tell us about a time when you've experienced what you might consider to be the worst loud sound you can imagine, and how did you react to it?


I always consider a baby's crying in fear to be the worst sound. But that is often not loud. If a baby is crying, I try to comfort the wee one -- at the very least locate a parent.
The worst loud sound that does not involve babies is the time when I was working in the Sexton building in downtown Minneapolis. The landlords were more like slum lords in that they just collected rent and did not do any upkeep unless it was absolutely necessary -- and that was rare. One of their tenants was an environmentalist wannabe and decided that the roof was the best place to hive his bees. It was also where the transformer for the electrical supply to the building was housed, maybe housed is not the best word, maybe put is a better word. If anyone asks you if bees can take out a power grid, the answer is yes. I don't know how it happened, but those bees or the hive did something to the transformer and it EXPLODED. That damn thing was just two floors above my head and it sounded like a cannon went off. I was expecting troops to come running through the streets. However, with no lights, no computers, no phones, I was done for the day. Or so I thought. This was before cell phones and the boss still wanted me to send letters out before the end of the day.
Me: How? The computers are down.
He: You have a pen. Write it out and get it out?
Me: Are you serious?
He: Yes. It has to be done.
Me: That's so unprofessional.
He: Just do it.
So I did. We looked stupid. So not only did I get the bejesus scared out of me, I got to put a whole new face on stupid.