It happened again…..

It happened again. I didn't think the universe was capable of such a disastrous shit storm in one day. Rest assured, this disaster day will NEVER beat the original one. But it does give it a run for its money. I’ll share another disaster day which involves public transport, dress socks, thermometers and an escalator.

Monday started off like any other day in paradise. A bone chilling morning of 12 degrees (haha!) at 6am to get dressed and catch the Sydney bus to work.  I was running late and forgot my cup of tea to take on the bus. It seems to be whenever I forget my tea the day never seems to start properly. I got on the bus which is always packed with an entertaining assortment of people. There’s the trades men, uni students, the crazy Chinese lady that wears all black and yells at everyone in Mandarin and the odd homeless person. I put my headphones in and mind my own business every morning otherwise someone will try and convert you to being a Jehovah’s witness in the 16 minute bus ride to railway square. True story bro. Got to railway square and went to buy a pie and cup of tea because the ones I made were still at home on the counter. I was going through my bag looking for my wallet only to realize someone had either stolen it on the bus or I’d dropped it (either one is completely convincing).After a fit of swearing and looking like the English version of the crazy Chinese lady on the bus, I had to call the bank in Canada and cancel all my bank cards. Here I was, 7 am without any money, bus cards, bank cards or id. This day could only get better, right? Managed the hour bus ride to work without any incidents and then commenced my 15 minute walk up the 90 degree hill. Okay, slight exaggeration but this hill is incredibly steep. It leaves you puffing and panting like a kid at fat camp that just had to do a 100m dash for a Twinkie.  As I was puffing and panting, it suddenly dawned on me that I had left my work socks at home and had nothing to wear with my steel cap boots!! I even went to a 7/11 looking for socks with no luck. When I got to work and explained my situation, my chef lent me a pair he had in his bag. He’s a bit of a rough-around-the edges, typical English lad. He smokes like a fiend, is a bit of a grub and can be the meanest bastard when he wants to be. He pulled these dress socks out of his bag that were animated with speech bubbles that had BAM! & POW POW!! And WTF?? Written all over them. Not to mention that they had holes in the heels and in the toes of them. Considering all circumstances, I wasn’t even going to question the last time they’d been graced by the washing machine. Beggars can’t be choosers I suppose! The day went by a little bit better than the morning. I made carrot cakes, 2 trays of brownies, caramel slice and a ton of hors d’oeuvres for a cocktail party. As I was taking the brownies out of the 350/180 degree oven, the thermometer on the rack fell off and landed on the top of my hand. It sat there for a few seconds and then I managed to shake it off. I couldn’t do that until I put the tray of brownies down otherwise hot brownie batter would have landed all over me.  As this day went from bad to worse, I decided to leave work early and would go back to Campbelltown to catch the footy/rugby game with Alex and Simon. I was trying to get out of work by 2:00 to get the bus. My boss kept calling me every 5 minutes just asking the dumbest questions and wanting to rant about everything. I ended up missing my first bus and then when the second bus came round, it was running ahead of schedule and did not stop to pick me up!! Fast forward a few hours, I hastily showered and ran for the bus. Go figure with the lucky streak I was having that day, the bus was running late which delayed me catching the train back to Campbelltown. What happened at the train station the icing on the cake.

Just a little side story…

Once upon a time, in a magical place called the Eaton’s centre in downtown Toronto, my dad was out shopping and had me in a little beach stroller/pram. My dad was still pretty new at the whole parenting situation and was pretty excited to be out with me. As we were going down an escalator, my dad had failed to notice the sign which said strollers/prams had to be turned around in order to prevent your baby from falling out and killing themselves. As we were going down, I stood up in the pram, dad lost grip and I went tumbling down the escalator with the pram still attached to me. My dad just about died of a heart attack running down the escalator expecting a dead baby in the pram at the bottom. Fortunately I was still alive (obviously, I wouldn’t be writing this if I wasn’t!) and appeared fine. Dad rushed me to St. Michael’s Hosiptal which is a convenient 250metres from the shopping centre and had me checked for a broken head and bones. I wonder if they built the hospital there for all the first time dads who’s kids fling themselves down escalators! The Doctor said what actually saved my life was a toque/beanie. The one dad put on my head was wayyy too big so he had to roll it a few times to fit me. For every step of the escalator I hit, the toque was there taking the brunt of the beating. Rumour has it I came out of that battle with some pretty legit escalator step marks embedded into my forehead!

Back to the train station in Sydney…

Due to delayed buses and my utter lack of organization, I was running behind to catch the train back for the game. I had about 2 and half minutes to get from one side of the station to the other. I was so determined to get on that train I was running at full speed. Imagine a klutzy giraffe running at full speed and trying to catch a train, that’s pretty much me! I was running up an escalator and suddenly lost my footing. Rather than falling down, I miraculously fell up on the escalator. My iPhone hit the step, then hand and my forehead. Instead of a beanie, an iPhone saved me my splitting my head open and looking like an idiot in the middle of central station. The metal case on my phone has a dent and a piece missing but I can deal with that. Better than looking like Nelly with a band aid across my forehead! I also owe some credit to my shoes too. I lost a row of gold metal studs on the front of my shoe which also slowed my feet down and prevented me from falling down the steps. On a plus side – I made it back to Campbelltown for 6:57 and the kick off was at 7!! and really, 2 for 2 on escalator incidents resulting in no stitches, comas or life threatening blood loss is a pretty lucky streak if you ask me.  

Seems like I don’t have little tidbits of bad stuff that happen here and there. It’s all or nothing with the southern hemisphere. I’m ready for round three universe!