June 9, 2010.

Last year at work I earned the nickname “Sparky”. It seemed appropriate after a few different occasions where “Bob” and I were in close quarters in a cramped engine room and I inadvertently arked a wrench or some other ferrous tool against a starter post. The resulting shower of sparks is actually quite pretty unless it’s only inches from your face and you’re wedged into some tight spot unable to recoil from the “POP” and shower of sparks.

Today, while working with “Pablo” I was able to see this dazzling light show from the other side of the wrench so to speak. We were in the engine room together with the engine and generator between us. I was replacing the alternator on the main engine while “Pablo” was changing out the raw water pump on the generator. Complacency yields the most spectacular light shows. He got a little careless with a wrench and soon there was the familiar “POP” and associated shower of sparks. It was almost as if someone were taking flash pictures down in the engine room with us.

But there was one huge difference. The “POP” and flash were accompanied by a noise that could only be described as a shrill squeal or perhaps even a shriek. Quickly, I looked around to see if a young girl had wandered aboard and had fallen down the hatch into the engine room. It turned out that shriek that I heard that resembled a prepubescent girl had only been “Pablo” shrieking in fear. And then there was laughter, copious laughter, of course all the laughter was coming from me. It’s always startling when you make that “POP” and associated shower of sparks but “Pablo’s” reaction was one for the record books. He sounded like a little girl who found a spider in her panties. I’m still laughing about it and I’m sure I’ll be grinning for days so I think it only appropriate that the occasion should be commemorated in a Haiku……

Pablo got sloppy
A shower of sparks erupts
It makes me giggle