Shakedown

I arrived at a house surrounded on three sides by apartment complexes. The house is for sale and the owner has finished pouring in tons of dough in upgrades. He happens to be an architect and has done a great job remodeling. Unfortunately, the landscaped backyard is hemmed in on all sides by the towering multi-story walls of the apartment complexes. I'm at the house because the owner's father is taking care of the place and noticed the back door pried open and a few items missing. The house is completely vacant but some vandal took a fire extinguisher and a wall mounted speaker and threw them in the swimming pool. I completed the short report and wished the old man good luck. He thanked me for my time and extended his the universal gesture of friendship: the handshake.

I'm sure you've all experienced a bad handshake. Steve from 'the sneeze' wrote about one awhile back that I found particulary funny. Let me tell you about mine:

In perfect sync, our hands met at the proper elevation and speed (check), the positioning of the palms, thumbs and fingers was spot-on (nice), and the firmness of the grip equalized to the appropriate pressure (so far, so good). We'd gotten through the hard part and only the 'shake' itself remained. Once the hands are interlocked, the movement part is a cinch (or so I thought). I began the vertical up and down movement I've been using since I was a kid. My partner, however, began a side-to-side sweeping motion. The counteracting forces of my up and down vs. his side to side contorted the shake into a clockwise circular swing. It now looked like we were swinging a jumprope only without the third person in the middle doing the jumping. 'You've gotta be kidding', I thought to myself as I tried to guide the shake into the proper upright position. He would have none of that, however, and continued his sideways oscillation.

After what felt like an hour we managed to release grip and go our separate ways.