I am currently having some sort of existential meltdown which is causing me to behave in an uncharacteristically reckless manner, and strangely, it’s very liberating. I defiantly used my hand instead of the cake tongs at the Sainsbury’s pastry counter the other morning, and was amazed to find that nothing happened. No accusing hand on the shoulder, no microbiological swabbing enforcement order, no bill for 25 fruit scones because they’d had to bin the whole basket after I’d contaminated the air around my chosen scone with my hand, nothing.
Wow, I thought, if nothing bad happens when I don’t use the cake tongs, what would happen if I tried something more daring, like saying ‘No’ to a request at work? It was not long before a suitable opportunity presented itself via the medium of the telephone, as I attempted to eat my bowl of soup at lunchtime and answer emails at the same time. The caller got the usual, “Eh? Who is it?” as I missed their name during the vital seconds it takes to rapidly stab the volume button on the phone the ten times it takes to get it to its feeble maximum volume. Then they got an uncharacteristic ‘No’ to their request. I gulped as I saw myself receiving a final warning at a Disciplinary Hearing, but the response of “That’s okay, I totally understand, I’ll see if I can find someone else” took me totally by surprise.
Blimey, I thought, if nothing bad happens when I say ‘No’ to a request, what would happen if, say, I deliberately turned up late for something? I flirted briefly with the idea, before deciding that reckless lateness was a step too far. I needed something less frightening to practise on. I looked around my desk for inspiration. What if…what if I saved the volume settings on the shared office phone handset, so that everyone else had to press the volume button ten times at the start of every call to turn it down, instead of me having to press it ten times at the start of every call to turn it up? I felt an exhilarating frisson of excitement as I picked up the handset, stabbed the volume button ten times and saw the words SAVE VOLUME SETTINGS? appear as usual. There was no hesitation as I hit the SAVE button, whilst letting out an evil laugh in the empty office.
“Everything okay, Moira?” said a puzzled student who had just appeared in the doorway.
“Fine, just fine”, I replied, taking the last mouthful of cold chicken soup.
The Cookie Bite Chronicles 
This delights me Moira. I stumbled upon your blog this morning and for the first time ever I have laughed out loud at our shared hearing peculiarities. I’ve struggled with my diagnosis for the last 15 years. I was quite happy until a friendly GP suggested I had something wrong with my hearing. I have hearing aids but usually keep them in my pocket where they don’t work so well. This recently resulted in them going through the quick wash and it took 3 days to dry them out in the warming oven. I’m now too scared to go back to the audiologist who will shout at me. My work mates are lovely but I’m always apologising – especially about the phone. Not anymore. I’m going in tomorrow to crank it up and then I too will hit the save button. Who knew deaf was fun?
Lovely to meet all these other cookie bite-ers. I thought I was all alone in Scotland x
Hi Louise, lovely to hear from you, the Scottish branch of the cookiebite club is growing and growing!
That’s a bummer about machine washing your aids, hope they can be brought back to life. It seems the only safe place for those babies is on the ears…I had a bit of a close shave this morning when I accidentally tried to use the Oticons as a mug mat when the spouse brought me coffee in bed before I’d put my glasses on.
I am delighted that the office phone volume cranking campaign is gaining momentum, I find that Hearing Awareness training works much better than Deaf Awareness training in the workplace 😉
You go Moira! What a daredevil you are becoming 🙂
Hi Sara, nothing can stop me now! Next week’s dreaded phone interviews are suddenly much more appealing…Mwahahaha!
🙂
😀