There was a time when getting shocked was quite simple.
You touched the wrong wire, stuck your finger somewhere it didn’t belong, or tried to fix something electrical without knowing what you were doing.
Today?
You don’t even have to leave your bed.
Let me tell you about an ordinary day in my life.
At least, it was supposed to be ordinary.
7:00 AM — A Beautiful Beginning
I woke up in a wonderful mood.
The sun was shining through the window. The birds were singing. The house was quiet.
I made myself a cup of coffee and sat down.
Life was beautiful.
Then I made my first mistake.
I checked the grocery prices online.
Tomatoes.
Just ordinary tomatoes.
I looked at the price and wondered whether someone had accidentally included a plane ticket to Italy.
Maybe these tomatoes had flown first class.
Perhaps they had their own little hotel rooms.
I checked the potatoes.
Same problem.
At this point, I decided that vegetables were becoming too successful for me.
I closed the website.
8:30 AM — The Electricity Bill
After breakfast, I opened my email.
There it was.
The electricity bill.
I opened it, looked at the amount, and immediately checked whether I had accidentally purchased the entire power station.
Nope.
Just my usual bill.
I slowly turned toward the lamp in the corner.
“Listen, my friend. We need to talk.”
The lamp remained silent.
“Are you secretly lighting up the neighborhood while we’re sleeping?”
Nothing.
I looked at the refrigerator.
“You too. Don’t pretend you’re innocent.”
For a moment, I considered switching everything off and living like people did two hundred years ago.
Then I remembered that two hundred years ago, there was no coffee machine.
Absolutely impossible.
10:00 AM — The News
I decided to read the morning news.
I know. Terrible decision.
The first headline shocked me.
The second confused me.
The third made me wonder whether I had accidentally opened a science fiction website.
By the fifth headline, I was seriously considering moving to a small cabin in the woods.
No television. No internet. No breaking news.
Just me, the trees, and a few squirrels.
Although, knowing my luck, the squirrels would probably start charging rent.
I closed the news.
Time for something relaxing.
11:00 AM — Social Media
I opened Facebook.
What a peaceful place!
Just kidding.
The first post explained how to become a millionaire in three days.
Wonderful!
I’ve been doing everything wrong for years.
The second post promised that drinking one special glass of water every morning would make me look twenty years younger.
I looked at my coffee.
“Don’t worry. I’m not leaving you.”
Then I saw a serious argument involving hundreds of comments.
The topic?
Whether pineapple belongs on pizza.
People were defending their opinions as if the future of humanity depended on that pineapple.
I wanted to write, “Dear people, it’s just pizza.”
But I was afraid someone would ask me to explain my position in seventeen paragraphs.
I closed Facebook.
My brain needed a vacation.
1:00 PM — The Supermarket Adventure
In the afternoon, I went grocery shopping.
Nothing special.
Bread, milk, eggs, some fruit, and a few things for dinner.
I walked through the aisles like a normal, responsible adult.
Then I saw the price of cheese.
I stopped.
I checked the label again.
Was it cheese or a small apartment?
I picked up a package, examined it carefully, and put it back.
Perhaps we could simply look at pictures of cheese while eating our sandwiches.
Finally, I reached the checkout.
The cashier scanned everything and announced the total.
I smiled politely.
Then I looked behind me.
“Excuse me, did you include the groceries of the person behind me?”
She smiled.
“No, sir. That’s all yours.”
I looked at my shopping bags.
They were not even full.
I paid and walked home, holding those bags as carefully as if they contained gold.
Technically, they almost did.
3:30 PM — The Wonderful World of Technology
Back home, I decided to do something productive.
I opened my computer.
An update was waiting.
Of course.
I clicked “Update.”
The computer restarted.
Then it restarted again.
Then it informed me that the update had failed.
Excellent.
I tried to open a website.
It asked me to prove I was human.
I selected all the pictures containing traffic lights.
Wrong.
I tried again.
Wrong.
After the third attempt, I began to question my own identity.
Maybe I wasn’t human.
Maybe I was a very tired robot who needed another coffee.
Eventually, the website accepted me.
I felt proud.
I had successfully proved that I existed.
What an achievement!
5:00 PM — The Most Dangerous Question
By late afternoon, I was ready for some peace.
I sat in my favorite chair with a cup of coffee.
No bills.
No news.
No social media.
No shopping.
Just silence.
Then my child walked into the room.
“Dad, can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Why do adults always say they don’t have money but still buy coffee?”
I froze.
My coffee stopped halfway to my mouth.
I had survived the grocery prices.
I had survived the electricity bill.
I had survived the news, Facebook, and my computer.
But this?
This was different.
I searched for a clever answer.
Something wise.
Something that would explain the complicated relationship between adults, money, and coffee.
Finally, I said:
“Because without coffee, we wouldn’t survive all those bills.”
He looked at me for a moment.
Then he nodded.
“That makes sense.”
And walked away.
I sat there feeling like a man who had just passed a very difficult exam.
9:00 PM — My Final Discovery
By evening, I was completely exhausted.
I hadn’t climbed a mountain.
I hadn’t run a marathon.
I hadn’t even done anything particularly exciting.
I had simply lived through one ordinary day.
And somehow, I had been shocked at least twenty times.
I remembered something from my childhood.
Our parents always warned us to be careful around electricity.
“Don’t touch that! You’ll get shocked!”
Those were simpler times.
Back then, you actually had to do something dangerous to receive a shock.
Today, you can be sitting peacefully in your pajamas, eating a sandwich, and checking your phone.
Suddenly, you’re shocked.
By a price.
By a headline.
By a comment.
By a bill.
Or by a child who asks a perfectly innocent question.
And the funniest part?
Tomorrow morning, I’ll wake up, make my coffee, check my phone, and start the whole adventure again.
Because apparently, I never learn.
You don’t need electricity to be shocked these days.
But here’s the biggest mystery of all.
With so many shocks every single day, why am I still not fully charged? ⚡😂
GK
