I had a plan. A bold, smart plan. Catch the bus into town, replace my travel concession ticket due to stupid loss of my uni student card, then head to the State Library to spend the day researching my next major essay. How hard can it be, right?
Yeah… not hard… unless… you find yourself getting an attack of ‘teh blonde’…
Read on… this is how the day ACTUALLY panned out…
6.30 Bloody Cat wakes me up.
6:31 Kick Bloody Cat out of bedroom and wedge the bedroom door shut so she can’t break back in (has been known to happen).
8:00* Slap alarm clock and get up, shower, dress, eat breakfast etc.
8:50 Walk up to bus-stop
8:55 Ride the bus to town on pre-paid ‘travel-ten’ ticket fare. The last fare left of the original 10.
9:40 Alight at Wynyard Station (bus terminated here) so decide to walk to Central Station rather than buy another fare as didn’t have prepaid and wanted to avail myself of usual student concession.
10:10 Arrive at Central Station and search for the designated Concessions Office.
10:20 Finally find it. Walk in and present self to Officer and hand over the requisite documentation. Open Backpack to find wallet.
10:21 Turn bag inside out, checking every pocket for wallet.
10:22 Repeat.
10:23 Give Up in disgust and despair.
10:24 Note that only cash I have is at the bottom of the bag and amounts to $2.05. Observe rather desperately that cash for bus across the bridge to retrieve wallet does not cost $2.05. Is twice that…
10:25 Remind self…good air in;bad air out.
10:27 Call old boss who just so happens to live very near Central Station and snag his home phone number in the hope his Gorgeous Mrs. is home… and that she is feeling magnanimous…
10:30 Sigh of relief that she is, and she is.
10:35 Walk up to Castlereagh St and meet Miss 9 at Reception.
10:36 Travel up to the apartment and have a nice cup of tea and a sit down with Gorgeous Mrs. which, incidentally, includes entertainment from Miss 4 who is, in short, a Party of One. Go past ‘Go’ and collect $5.
11:10 Head back downstairs and walk back up to Wynyard to catch bus back across the bridge.
11:30 Buy Ticket, say goodbye to $4.20. Get comfy while waiting for bus.
11:45 Get on Bus.
12:15 Get Home.
I was so fed up, of course, that I decided not to bother going back across the Bridge, wasting more time sitting in the bus, or more money paying for tolls and car parking so instead, spent the day alternately freaking out that my day was wasted and actually starting to consolidating the data I had managed to find for this essay.
The thing about all this business is that on days like this I’m reminded just how important it is for my emotional landscape to have my life under control and just how infuriating it is to get tripped up by my own stupidity.
However, in its favour, a day like yesterday makes me work that much harder NOT to let it happen next time around and so today I’ve had to get my ducks in a row to get some control back. Consequently, I’ve had to make a tough decision that means that I’ve withdrawn completely from the ‘Bigger than Big’ thing happening in the city next week. I would love to go, and as always, I’d love to be taking the pictures… particularly as it’s a great chance to catch up with a bunch of my friends in the movement who don’t live locally… but I really don’t think I can take 3 days out of my uni assessment and freelancing schedule to make it happen this year. Given that this will be the first time I’ve missed Presence in the 10 years I’ve been in Oz, it’s going to be weird not to go. Weird… and a little disappointing.
However, I believe it will pay off… both in terms of achieving the results I want on the assessment, and as importantly, it will help smooth out my emotional world and give me back some of the feeling of actually being back in control…
…at least until the next attack of ‘teh blonde.’
*bet you’re jealous… student life has its compensations…
Actually, as an interested observer, I don’t think it’s a bad thing you’re not going this year … to me it’s kinda like you keep doing stuff after leaving high school just ’cause you’ve always done them rather than making a real conscious choice that this will be a part of your life at this point … so next year you can really decide to go (or not) and have a blast.
And yes, I’m STILL missing my student concession card … 18 years after I handed it in!
Yeah, sounds good! But I will miss everyone, that’s a bummer.
Can understand the feeling: I missed some things this year [not perhaps as major] due to uni stuff which annoyed me.
And what an adventure of a morning! Here’s to a rather more sedate weekend for you.
I was very upset when I read that even the healthy brain begins to decline at 27… but it did go a long way to explaining the increasing amount of blonde moments I’ve been having. I try to simplify the things I need to remember, which is why I’m a believer on one wallet for everything, if I could attach my keys to it I would. This means I can’t get on a bus without having money, student card etc with me. I was very annoyed when I got my provisional driving license and found that it’s actually too big to fit in my wallet Now I know why girls have those giant wallets that don’t fit in your pocket. I can’t decide whether I prefer being able to put my wallet in my pocket or not having to wonder where my driving license is… such are my every day dilemmas, but luckily I forget about them quite often!
Oooh, forgetting the wallet, sucky!
Nice to see some bulk posting going on round here. Just quietly.
*slinks off*
So the wallet was just forgotten, and not lost? Because that’s how it goes for me all the freaking time!
Yeah, only forgotten… Thank heavens!
OMGOSH – what a day! I’m so glad you had someone there to give you the $5 – what a mess that would have been to try and get home w/o it!!!