Had another scatty moment today - a very long moment actually... It started when my mobile phone beeped to say the battery was low. So I took it to the little shelf where I normally leave it to recharge, plugged it into the socket, and went back to my desk.
As I was doing stuff on the computer, every now and again I thought I heard a beep from far away - very similar, it seemed, to the kind of beep my mobile phone emits in order to tell me that its battery is low.
Poor little phone. There it was, at the other end of the house, trying to communicate with me, and there was me in another room, totally ignoring it.
Have you worked it out yet? The Brits amongst you may have figured it out by now - yes, you're right, I hadn't switched the socket on.
The Israelis amongst you (and possibly people from other countries that don't share this British invention) may be wondering what on earth I'm talking about. Switch a socket on? What do you mean switch a socket on?
Well, this is one of those things I had to learn when I came to England. I remember when I discovered it - it was probably my second day in London, I was staying in a room at a university there (they let the students' rooms during the summer break) and had tried to switch the lamp on so that I could read in bed, but no, it didn't work. I thought it might need a new light bulb. The person at the reception desk was surprised when I said the lamp wasn't working - had I switched it on at the wall?
It's amazing the number of normal everyday things that can be different in different countries - so many things I've had to learn here! I had to learn that electricity sockets here have an on-off switch; I had to learn about bayonet-fitting light bulbs; I had to get used to separate taps for hot and cold water (though in the kitchen here we do have this fantastic new invention called a mixer tap - the only kind of tap I knew back home).
There are probably lots of other things that I don't even remember learning about, as I've got used to the way things go here. I've got so used to driving on the left that when I go home for a visit I have to really concentrate when crossing the road, and once on a visit to Poland I actually stepped off the pavement when I shouldn't have, and got a very loud beep from a driver who obviously didn't fancy the idea of running me over...
Now, is that poor mobile cooked yet :-)
As I was doing stuff on the computer, every now and again I thought I heard a beep from far away - very similar, it seemed, to the kind of beep my mobile phone emits in order to tell me that its battery is low.
Poor little phone. There it was, at the other end of the house, trying to communicate with me, and there was me in another room, totally ignoring it.
Have you worked it out yet? The Brits amongst you may have figured it out by now - yes, you're right, I hadn't switched the socket on.
The Israelis amongst you (and possibly people from other countries that don't share this British invention) may be wondering what on earth I'm talking about. Switch a socket on? What do you mean switch a socket on?
Well, this is one of those things I had to learn when I came to England. I remember when I discovered it - it was probably my second day in London, I was staying in a room at a university there (they let the students' rooms during the summer break) and had tried to switch the lamp on so that I could read in bed, but no, it didn't work. I thought it might need a new light bulb. The person at the reception desk was surprised when I said the lamp wasn't working - had I switched it on at the wall?
It's amazing the number of normal everyday things that can be different in different countries - so many things I've had to learn here! I had to learn that electricity sockets here have an on-off switch; I had to learn about bayonet-fitting light bulbs; I had to get used to separate taps for hot and cold water (though in the kitchen here we do have this fantastic new invention called a mixer tap - the only kind of tap I knew back home).
There are probably lots of other things that I don't even remember learning about, as I've got used to the way things go here. I've got so used to driving on the left that when I go home for a visit I have to really concentrate when crossing the road, and once on a visit to Poland I actually stepped off the pavement when I shouldn't have, and got a very loud beep from a driver who obviously didn't fancy the idea of running me over...
Now, is that poor mobile cooked yet :-)
1 comment:
you don't have to turn sockets on in america. we're a socket ready country. ;-)
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