Blue jackets and red scarves (day 171)

bacterial update: I bottled the Pu-Erh Kombucha last night.  It tastes really good, like a nice sweet wine.  I'm still amazed that this transformation can happen.  I mean I love Pu-Erh tea on its own, but its transformation to kombucha is nothing short of a marvel.  I'm wanting it to carbonate a bit so I'm leaving it at room temperature for a while.  I'm a little nervous about bottles shattering or the tea shooting up to the ceiling after I open a bottle.   I might chicken out and open one tonight to test the level of carbonation and see how much longer I have before the gamble of one more day is just foolish.

I was part of a group strategic planning session today.  Interaction in a group is not my favourite dynamic but the facilitator was exceptional and I feel we got a lot done.  Still the day was long.  I left the school late and entered the GI zone.   Being hit by the Olympics group dynamic just about put me over the edge of normal social behaviour.  Suddenly everyone around me was wearing 'the colours', were on vacation, quite likely buzzed, and caught up in their small group universe.   Under normal circumstances I might have just weaved in and out of such groups but today I just wanted to pop everyone's bubble.  Bah hum bug.

I just ate.  I feel better.

I've never been one for team spirit.   I am committed to the groups I belong to but always lurking is a skepticism about mob behaviour.  I even have an aversion to Facebook groups.  We do silly things if enough unreasonable people are making it normal.   I wonder though, are the people that easily lose themselves in the team happier?  Do they feel like they belong?  Like they are surfing with the waves of the tribe?  What differentiates the people that can lose themselves in the team and those that can't?  I can't even picture myself cheering a hockey team genuinely.  Doesn't seem to be something that can be taught.  Yet I've heard that we are all subject to mob mentality given the right conditions.  Maybe I have an instinctive aversion to the likely conditions.  Not yet curious enough to experiment with this.

A song for this post.