Don’t Jump
By far the most awkward thing you can do in an elevator is to jump, especially with a friend. There’s a story behind this. This past Sunday, I was riding in the Piano Row elevator at Emerson accompanied by Bryan and Kate, my fellow survivors. On the ninth floor, we awkwardly fought with elevator number one, trying it to go down when it was set on going up. After finally pressing the call button on the outside and the floor button inside in the right sequential pattern, we selected floor one and began our descent. Bryan and I were talking about this very blog post, and how elevators really are pretty awkward when subject came up of jumping in elevators. If you haven’t tried it, it’s really fun. When you’re going down and you jump in the air, by the time you come back down the floor has dropped further than when you jumped, so you can get some air. It feels neat, and is only something I’ve ever done when completely alone in an elevator.
Bryan and I accidentally jumped at the same time, which was a big mistake. Apparently new elevator systems work like theatrical fly systems, and when 300+ pounds of college student is lifted off the carriage and into the air, the system notices and faults, hanging in limbo until someone manually clears the fault. So basically, we were stuck, and had to use the intercom to call public safety so they could send someone over from a block away. Luckily nobody was panicking, actually we had been bored and looking for something to go. Careful what you wish for.
We tried forcing the door open, but when it didn’t work the service guy said they were going to the roof to get us out. We hoped this meant climbing though an elevator shaft to the roof, which would have made the whole experience so worth it. After a very awkward moment where the elevator dropped several feet, then a few more without powering back up, the numbers re-illuminated and we moved to the sixth floor where the doors opened allowing us to escape. We lucked out in the sense that this happened in a brand new high tech elevator in Piano Row. If we had made this mistake in the Little Building or any older system, the consequences could have been much worse. My point is that it’s really fun to jump in elevators and if you like taking risks you should try it, but it can be really awkward if you jumped and broke an elevator with anybody other than you’re friends.
