A most surreal experience

My new job requires a security clearance. "Tickets" to use the popular slang. The process involves a polygraph. I went for that on Monday.

Getting there was no problem, despite the snow. Getting in to the visitor center and getting a visitor's badge was no problem. In fact there was no real problem with anything. The experience as a whole was not unpleasant. The weird part was the actual polygraph test.

First, I was LARGELY dissapointed. Polygraphs are now digital. So I didn't get to watch little needles tracking me as I answered. Second, they track your blood pressure changes. To do this you had to wear a blood pressure cuff. Inflated. For about a five minute stretch at a time. Several times over.

The hardest part though, was sitting all hooked up, facing a door, waiting for the gentleman to ask me the next question, while trying to focus on not fidgeting, not breathing heavily (rather hard with the asthma), and not zoning out, while staring at a grey doorknob in a room that was 3 shades of gray.

Hopefully I passed and I won't have to repaet the whole process.