The beauty of laughter

You have to put on your best pair of rose coloured glasses and consider the glass half full in times like this to keep perspective and a sense of humour.  Friends are doing an amusing job of keeping me laughing as we navigate through excruciatingly long days, egos and uncertainty at work.

Laughter and camaraderie have a way of lightening the load and reinforcing you are not alone:

- We laughed until we cried testing the new ‘telepresence meeting’ room this week. London has never looked so close as we covered our eyes, yelling ‘nOOOO!’ to avoid examining the nose hairs of our comedian colleague who seemed to delight in pressing his face against the camera. (I can tell you high definition television takes on a whole new meaning!)

- Arriving in my office to see ‘Happy Birthday!’ on the white board in big letters, my desk covered in presents and a fabulous birthday book reminding me the day was mine and to live it up.

February birthday cakes

- Another friend winding me up about my birthday all day making me think it was forgotten yet again, until I received an email with a ridiculously cheesy ‘Hippo Birdie to Ewe’ tribute just before midnight.  

- My Flemish officemates teaching me Dutch: (translated) ‘a man with an ape’, ‘I did NOT sleep well’, ‘I love you’.  These are the phrases of the week…

- Borrowing a random lady’s mexican sombrero in a bar in Brussels (when she wasn’t looking), passing it around, taking pictures of all five of us, only to return it without her realising it….  followed by the great ‘frites’ escapade in search of Belgian fries and mayonnaise at 2.00 AM on a Thursday.  (We finally found an open friterie in the red light district on the suggestion of one savvy New York-based friend who ‘had never spent much time there’.) The owners were so amused by us, we ended up with free portions. (I am still finding frites in my cream coloured car interiour where no one is ever allowed to eat but it was worth it!)

- The Italian carnival trip last weekend with its own priceless adventures and laughter deserves a post of its very own.

- And so much more…

Yes, laughter heals and makes life all the more entertaining.  It’s been a good couple weeks.