Yesterday I trudged off to the local YMCA to complete my ritual lane swimming (I made the mistake of marrying a woman who is a triathlete; we are competing in Ironman Austria this summer).
It was midday and I anticipated the lanes would be empty. A few breaststrokers were paddling slowly up and down the Slow and Medium lanes so I moved over to Fast. (Hey, I can't even do a flipturn so I rarely get to swim in the fast lane.)
Wouldn't you know it but some dude was slowly creeping down the fast lane while bumping into the lane markers every third stroke!
"Come on!" I thought to myself, "This guy is the slowest swimmer in the pool and he's hogging the fast lane!"
Now the first guideline of the RHB (real human being) is "assume everyone is intelligent." And just because I teach the stuff, doesn't mean it always comes naturally. But that little niggling phrase kept repeating itself so I shrugged and resolved myself to swimming around him.
I started my regiment of lengths (a more boring activity you cannot imagine) and started to hear a high pitched "woof woof" sound. I figured that not only was this guy a lousy swimmer but he's a pretty loud breather as well!
8 lengths into my workout, the lifeguard caught me at one end of the pool and asked if I would mind switching lanes over to Medium.
"The guy in your lane is blind and we're afraid you are going to run him over," he explained.
That's when I realized the "woof, woof" sound was being muttered by an anxious seeing eye dog at the side of the pool watching his master...
(I later chatted with Bob, who got Mixely from a New Jersey Seeing eye dog center. Mixely whines when Bob is in the deep end, but not the shallow pool.)
My RHB lesson today?
1. Assume everyone is intelligent (you never know why the guy in the lane in front of you is driving slowly.)
2. Black lab seeing eye dogs are smarter than 49 year old white guys.
Dear Dave,
In the fall of 2007, my wife and I were in Boston on business. While strolling near Boston Common, two university students approached us and asked if we were American citizens. We replied we were visiting from Canada. They smiled and moved on. I looked around and saw them passing out flyers extolling the virtues of a guy named Barack Obama. 
You probably know a girl or a guy like Stephanie. You might call her amazing or you might say he's a good guy.
The 3rd rule of the Real Human Being is "get over yourself."
