michael (originally posted 09.18.06)

i was working with positives (you know, the opposite of negatives, often called slides, from the analog photography days). sleeving them, fitting some into slides, scanning. i looked down and saw a black glove on my left hand, no glove on my right. and then it happened. i had this eerie identification with michael jackson. i think: "maybe michael was crafty." one hand gloved, the other not, can be useful for some craft projects. must be other areas where this is true.

while typing the above, a more plausible explanation hits me. maybe michael is obsessive/compulsive. he confines touching things that come into contact with the general public to the one gloved hand. kinda like when you have washed up at a public restroom and try not to touch the doornob as you leave. only all the time.

and, if so, what to do with the contaminated glove? bad to carry it around with you. can't rest your hand on your body. don't want any common germs (or worse) jumping from the glove. risk self-contamination when taking off the glove. being obsessive/compulsive, maybe he has some high-tech clean-box that he can periodically place his gloved hand into to be disinfected. and/or, perhaps the glove has some patented germ resistant coating (think teflon for germs). i bet he switches to a new glove at least once a day. so wasteful.

(this story would work much better with some illustrations from travis millard)