April 23, 2007

Stage Fright

As most of the wretched souls who have the distinct displeasure of knowing me in the abysmal exercise in futility known as real life would probably agree, I am not someone who conjures up images of a person likely to experience stage fright. In fact, quite the opposite, I generally relish in the opportunity to publicly embarrass myself in front of multitudes of unforgiving people; my public performance of the infamous Engineering Dance (which has tragically become part of my clubbing repertoire) in front of hundreds of incoming Berkeley freshman in 2003 and 2005 should be evidence enough. However, last week, in a very uncharacteristic moment, I experienced a severe bout of stage fright at the most inopportune time: while giving a urine sample for a work-mandated drug test.