Stanziliëri

huh?
what?
Crunchy?
No thanks I already had my breakfast.
Or actually... I didn't.
Come to think of it, I didn't even have any lunch.
Hmmmm....
Standing on the platform of one of the busy Amsterdam railway stations in the banking district, balancing my laptop bag, blackberry, private phone, prefab food which I just bought, I try to eat some, in my opinion, well deserved sushi.
The words Credit Crunch are something not form my world.
Actually, they should be far from anybody's world. There is no Credit Crunch. The financial market is as healthy as can be. But, it suffers from the same problem of every other thing in life: panic syndrome. Take your average random opera building (or any building where large groups of people gather, for that matter) and start running around screaming FIRE!!! FIRE!!! FIREEEE!!!! HEEEELP FIRE!!!! EVERYBODY FLEE! RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!!! FIREEE!!!!! (Oh well, you get the picture) and disaster happens inadvertently. People start panicking. Running around as headless chickens. Pushing and trampling each other to death. Probably breaking electrical things or heated things, and fire might actually break out. Or another example, which happened in The Netherlands a bunch of years ago: somebody had said that the garbage liners were running out of stock at the super market. People panicked and started running to the shops to buy as many as they could. The shops not ready for this sudden rush, were soon out of stock, and the prophecy had itself fulfilled again.
The latter example is far less serious than the first, but the principle is just as worrying. It's exactly what's happening to the financial market at the moment. WIth the mayor problem, that if people won't stop panicking and get their act together, it will actually spread to every day life.

But will it?
People talk a lot about the Credit Crunch. They have serious conversations about it and talk about how bad it all is. But when you ask them about what they did last weekend, they tell you about a party this and a restaurant that, etcetera etcetera. Credit Crunch? Say what?

Standing there on that windy platform, I unwrap some food, and realize how far from the non-existing crunch I am. Too far actually. I look at all this food I'm carrying, and am amazed. I actually carry more wrappings than actual food. The amount of plastic involved is outrageous. Plastic wrapping around a plastic base and a plastic cover, with some plastic decoration and some plastic cutlery. And then there's the other 4 similar items in my hands as well... Totally crazy. Maybe the Crunch is good for something. Maybe it'll reduce this none sense a bit. But then again.... would I still buy it?
Well... would I have a choice?

But having much more serious things on my mind than a silly little Credit Crunch (it DOES sound like muesli to me no matter how much I hear it or tell me to stop being such an idiot) I move into the train that takes me to the airport. Once at the airport I sit down in one of the seats on the platform, and delve into whichever random crap my Blackberry has to tell me. As I sit there my mind wanders...

*FLASH*

What the f* ?
I look up.
There's a pretty lady standing opposite me with a photo camera. She tells me she's an artist. She tells me she was intrigued by the way I was sitting there, in my kashmir coat, my luxury bag, my prefab food, my tailor made suit, and my smartphone, all wrapped up in my own little world, thinking about.... about.... yeah, what about? And she wanted to put that into an artwork.
I smiled, and told her thanks and wished her well with that. I didn't ask her name or contact details or anything. Even though she was quite pretty.
But hey, she didn't know what was in my mind. Her artwork will show something where everybody who sees it will wonder "what is he thinking about?" And I was thinking about Her.
Mrs. E B-W.
Thinking about how me thinking about her is being put into some artwork somewhere makes me smile inside and out with a grin wider than the mouth of the Amazon. A thought about her is such a beautiful thought. A thought worth its weight in gold. And thinking of it... the thought was quite a heavy one actually, so that's a serious thing to say. So I can well understand the artist was intrigued by the look of me (no that's not vanity speaking) wrapped deep in my thoughts. A thought such a pleasure to have, it has to be a pleasure to see.

Credit Crunch? No, sorry, I just had my sushi...