I had an eventful morning today.

After stepping out of the shower, I noticed that my electric razor was plugged in and charging overnight through a power strip that wasn’t turned on.

Discouraged, I grabbed my steam iron’s cord and plugged it in while walking back into the bathroom to brush my teeth.

After coming out with sparkly clean teeth, I noticed that I accidentally plugged in my mini-oven rather than my steam iron. Apparently, my subconscious mind wanted to iron my clothes with oven plates.

In other news, I don’t understand why people come into a lecture hall and ask if someone is already sitting in an empty seat near you.

Sure, it might be considered respectful to make sure the seat is not already occupied, but it annoys me out of my mind because the seat is clearly empty and nobody is already sitting there. If someone was actually sitting there but temporarily left, you would think that they would leave their bag or other stuff behind so nobody sits in their seat.

If they were truly concerned that they were actually causing an inconvenience to someone else by ac­cidentally taking their seat, they should at least spend the time to formulate the question so it doesn’t inconvenience the person being asked the question. Something along the lines of “are you saving this seat for anybody?” would be much better and more intelligent.

So if you’re someone who asks “is someone sitting there,”

Stop.