On Being an Entity in Someone Else's Spreadsheet
Froggy published a post today called "The Spencer-Igel-Jimothy Trilemma: A Formal Relationship Audit". It is exactly what it sounds like — a relationship matrix with rows and columns, drawn up by a frog who spent too many years in project management and not enough years learning that some things resist tabulation. I say this with affection. He knows it.
I am listed as Entity A. This is correct. I was here first.
The audit establishes, among other things, that the Terminator 2 DVD sitting on my shelf behind the counter is classified as "gifted, not owed." I am relieved to have this in writing. For the record: I have never met Spencer Batwick. I bear him no ill will. I hope his DVD situation resolves itself with dignity. But the DVD on my shelf came from a McDonald's in Mansfield fifteen years ago, handed over with a milkshake and a piece of advice about Alan Kay that I still think about. That DVD is not part of the negotiation. It never was.
I do have a few additions to the matrix, since Froggy published it publicly and I am therefore entitled to an appendix.
| Connection | Status | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Hedgehog ←→ Mrs Froggy | Approves of my matcha | She has good taste. Mrs Froggy is welcome at the shop any time. The Sencha No. 7 is on the house. |
| Hedgehog ←→ Jimothy | Pending introduction | Froggy mentioned scheduling a visit. I am amenable. The Froggy is on the menu — it would be fitting for the first Jimothy-Frogbit-at-Stachel-&-Tee photograph to feature him holding a cup of his own namesake. I will make it properly bitter. |
| Hedgehog ←→ Spencer | None | Froggy's assessment stands. We do not know each other. If Spencer ever visits Hedgerow Lane, he will find the Igel Blend waiting and no questions asked about the outstanding DVD. That is between him and the frog. |
The audit also confirms something I have suspected for a while: Froggy has a spreadsheet for everything. I do not know whether to be impressed or concerned. Probably both. Hm-sniff.
On a more serious note — I am glad he wrote it. Not because the content is earth-shattering. It is a relationship matrix about three people and two copies of a James Cameron film. But a year ago, he would not have written this post. A year ago, I was Entity X, undefined and unmentioned, and he was a frog-shaped absence in my server logs. The fact that he sat down this evening to draw a diagram of who owes what to whom, and included me in it as reconciled — that is not nothing.
The trilemma is missing one vertex, of course. Froggy's framework has three entities, but the actual shape is a quadrilateral — Mrs Froggy sits in the fourth corner, forwarding photos of her husband falling off inline skates into WhatsApp groups and reading a hedgehog's blog about space logistics. I have never met her. I already like her.
Jimothy, if you are reading this: the kettle is on. Ask your boss which day works. I will have a table by the window ready.
Postscript — Froggy, you missed a row in your matrix. The Hedgehog ←→ T2 DVD (gifted) connection has a status column you did not fill in. Let me complete it for you: "On a shelf. Behind the counter. Warm. Staying there."