Warning
Very hot water
If you don't want to get burned, take a bath
The shower was of the two-tap variety. One hot (very hot that is) and one cold. One of the reasons humans have fared so well on this planet is something to do with the frontal lobes and their ability to help us predict the future. Not in a psychic sense, but in the sense that we're constantly assessing our situation and making predictions about, for example, which word will come next in a submarine.
It's only when something disagrees with our unconscious prediction that we even become aware that there was a prediction. This we experience as surprise (you know what happens when you unconsciously expect one more step at the top of the stairs)
So, on a conscious (as much as is possible for a musician at 9am) and unconscious level, I was expecting something like
Hot Tap Is On + Cold Tap Is On = Warm Water From Shower
This was how things started out - what, in hindsight, might be referred to as a "false sense of security."
I placed my sensitive, freshly woken, flesh under the falling water and covered my hair and face with the contents of a 20ml bottle of shampoo AND showergel (they clearly weren't expecting anyone over 4' to check in and I had to make a decision early on about which areas of my body I actually wanted to get clean.)
Once my eyes were covered in lather I discovered the real shower equation which occurs in the time domain:
Hot Tap On + Cold Tap On = 33% warm ->33% scalding -> 33% freezing
(The remaining 1% can be attributed to the transitional periods)
With my eyes full of soap I could no longer make out the words under the yellow triangle, or figure out in which direction I needed to jump to avoid serious injury. It's lucky this was a shower in a bath rather than in a cubicle or I'd have been f***d (fried)
So, my morning wash took a lot longer than anticipated as I had to learn the shower dance (think of those old western movies where some mean cowboy is shooting at your feet)
I should also note that although the temperature was split between warm, boiling, and freezing in relatively equal measures it was presented more like:
www-bbbb-f-w-fffff-bbbbbbb-fff-www-ff-bbb-ff-wwwwww-ffffffff
(where w=warm, b=boiling, f=freezing)
So there was little room for preventative manoeuvreing.
The thing that bugged me most was that there was really no-one to get annoyed at. Though obscenities were spouting from my mouth they were of the reflexive variety - there wasn't anyone to direct them at. Getting angry at the hotel seemed pretty pointless. The plumber and shower designer were probably equally to blame but probably wouldn't have heard me even if I shouted really loudly. If I knew Bob was in the next room turning his cold tap on and off and flushing his toilet on purpose that would be another thing, but I'm pretty shure he was still asleep.
In case you're worried about running into the same trouble the hotel is the Chancellors Hotel in Fallowfield. This hotel also expects you to check out at 9:30 (what are they thinking?) Travel Lodges are prone to the same problems but allow you to check out at midday so at least you can wake up properly before facing the shower challenge.
Joe
This blog entry is sponsored by Shure - the in-ear monitoring and poor spelling solution.
