Worst. Morning. Ever. (A Comedy of Errors)

Today was a truly bad morning.

One might even call it a truly shit morning.

In fact, one might go as far as to say that this morning sucked balls.

I woke up late this morning. Again. This in itself was not breaking news, as I'm pretty much late to every single class five days a week, but this was especially bad because out of 18 lectures for Tort Law, I've only ever been to three this semester. I really shouldn't have picked the 8:30 a.m time, it's pretty much all my stupid fault for having too much faith in my own moral and physical stamina.

Anyway...I figured I'd still have time to get to my all-important English tutorial, as this week the entire class was dissecting my crappy little short story and humilating as it was, I was required to be there to receive feedback and be assessed (and probably humiliated). So off I trotted to open the garage door.

I pressed the big green button.

Silence.

Pressed it again.

Nothing.

Tried the other remote.

Nothing.

There was this little blinking red light on the so-called 'automatic' door system, a little blinking light saying, "Hah! You're trapped! I've got you my pretty, and your little Yaris too!"

(insert cinematic cackling)

I was already running late. But as I kept poking desperately at the door control, I tried to keep my panic under control. Never mind that my car was effectively trapped.

Okay, Daphne...don't panic. You're a thinking woman. Not one of those helpless little damsels in distress...c'mon, you work with electronics, what's the first thing you should do?

Aha! The manual override!

Manual override was duly executed, but during this whole ordeal, I still hadn't put on my little black boots, and I'd just scuttled around in a festy old pair of blue garden scuffs. I ran to put the alarm on, totally forgetting that I didn't have shoes, and then I locked the door.

It was then that I looked down and noticed that I was still wearing the festy pair of blue garden scuffs. And these slippers, aside from being totally old and dirty and hideous, were also five sizes too big as they belonged to my dad.

No problemo. I'll just get my house key and open the...

...oh.

Bugger.

I had left my key in the house, and LOCKED MY SHOES INSIDE.

Idiocy could go no further.

In my defense, I've been sick for the past few days (like pretty much everyone else, really) and was extremely tired and stressed and wasn't thinking straight at all. However, I do concede that there was a fair amount of sheer stupidity inherent in the act that wasn't sickness-related at all.

I stared down at the horrible pair of garden slippers, which clashed hideously with my hipsters and jacket, and decided that life was indeed, terribly cruel. I couldn't DRIVE with them because they were too big (I ended up having to press the pedals in my besocked state) and I certainly would not be caught dead at uni with them, and I couldn't also go up seven flights of stairs without tripping over my own feet.

And because I like to keep up my own running internal commentary to stop myself from panicking (I also talk out loud to reassure myself while driving), the inner monologue continued...

Okay, Daphne. Calm. You have a mobile phone.

So I rang my mother.

Unfortunately, my mother does not have a mobile phone. (This is all going to change tomorrow night, when I will forcibly drag her down to my workplace and I will personally buy her a cheap prepaid phone so that this does not happen again.)

Anyway, I figured that if I rang her I might be able to stop into her office and pick up her housekey. And then drive back and rescue my shoes. Unfortunately, she has the most useless receptionists ever.

The first one said she'd put me through.

Then she hung up on me.

The second one said dismissively, "Oh, I'll send her an e-mail and tell her."

"But it's URGENT-"

"I said I'll send her an e-mail."

Funny, last time I checked, my Mum's office WAS THREE BLOODY DOORS DOWN FROM RECEPTION. SURELY IT WOULDN'T KILL YOU TO GET UP AND PASS ON A FREAKING NOTE?!

So I sat there for fifteen minutes in the driveway. In my car. Alone. (It would have been nice if there'd been pouring rain and some atmospheric symphonic music, resplendent with doleful violins, but y'know, you can't have everything.)

And then the cat got her revenge for me neglecting to feed her that morning, and so jumped up on my car bonnet and stared at me through the glass.

I was meant to go shopping with a friend at 11 a.m, but obviously plans had changed- so I rang her and offered to pick her up from the station, as I was sick of just sitting there in the driveway watching my cat groom herself on my pristine metallic paintwork.

I told her what had happened. She said, "Wow, I'm so glad that I'm not the only one who's done that."
"Really?" said I. (I felt a sense of camaderie at the thought that at least someone else had locked themselves out shoeless at some point). "Oh, I don't feel quite so loser-ish then."
"Well, granted, I was quite drunk at the time..."
"Well, I'm plain cold SOBER and I still managed to do something this dumb."

I picked her up and decided that we'd go shopping- well, that I would shuffle into Chadstone as quickly as possible in my ugly hideous never-meant-to-see-the-light-of-day 'shoes' and buy new ones. So we ran into K-Mart and she kindly started seeking out Size 8s for me to try on.

You know how they say 'beggars can't be choosers'?

Well, they can.

I COULD have purchased $8 ballet flats in a hideous shade of plastic royal blue with BOWS, but I figured that if I was going to spend $40 on emergency shoes they might as well be decent ones...so we scampered upstairs to Target and I grabbed a pair of brown boots and bought them on the spot. Then I tottered out and we got a coffee.

And then to cut a long story short, we both shared a plate of dumplings from the food court and got food poisoning.

So after we met up with some friends at Camberwell, I had to scurry her back because she was literally about to throw up in my car.

I offered her the bag with my stupid garden shoes in it if she needed to hurl, because frankly, I couldn't have cared less if they'd been coated in vomit. Stupid shoes.

And that was my day.

On the upside, when my sister came home at night after a long day at the hospital, she had stopped in at Safeway to buy me a 'cheer-up pie' as she had gathered from my hysterical SMS that morning that I was having a shit day. So at least there was the comfort of apple berry crumble. I love having siblings.

I thought the trauma of the day was over, until I realised that I had lost the sore throat from last night and developed a cold instead. So now I have no sense of taste and I sound like a human foghorn.

On the upside, I just realised that in my congested state, I can do a really bitchin' Tracy Chapman impression.

Like, a really good one.

I think I'll just spend tomorrow doing Cher impersonations.

The Facebook Debate

Facebook.

That's a fun word. It provokes different and stimulating reactions. Much like 'Iraq'. And 'Bush'. And any other word that smacks of world politics. You get the rabid devotees, you get the 'no-way-in-hell' crowd, and you get the neutral little fence-sitters (like me.)

But ah, Facebook...

...tis something of a blessing, yet the bane of my existence.

After mostly neglecting Facebook for months, except to use that nifty photo sharing feature, I dove back into the tangled web of online networking earlier tonight. And then I remembered exactly why I spent so much time on it last year during exam time.

Torts...versus...Facebook.

Property law....versus Facebook.

No contest. It's a time sapper and the ultimate procrastination tool. I wandered around the site posting random crap on people's walls instead of working on my tutorial problems.

And the thing about Facebook is that everyone is literally at your fingertips. The RSS feed in particular is pretty much the ultimate stalking tool and a voluntary offer to relinquish your privacy. I'm trying very hard not to shout out to my beloved s21A of the Crimes Act, but there, I did it...21A 21A 21A....

Facebook is sort of useful, in that I've caught up with old friends from high school and primary school, and it's handy if people are overseas.

On the other hand, it is, once again, a poor substitute for face-to-face contact. I keep hearing about the whole '90% of communication is in your body language'- now and then, that little factoid tends to pop up in weekend magazines and the ever trusty adhesive backs on Libra pads. But people nowadays, including myself, are so time-poor that it quickly becomes a cheap substitute for human interaction. Kind of like missing breakfast and drinking an Up-And-Go instead. Cheap nutrition that won't last.

I strongly believe that the anathema to Facebook is...

...coffee.

I love coffee. I love the aroma, I love the fact that a grande size latte can lift my mood right up, I like doodling on the little paper cup in lectures while Kristine gives me odd looks, I like cradling the steaming cup to my lips and breathing in the steam, I like clutching the mug on morning shifts at work (assistant manager: "Quick! Scull it before a customer interrupts you!") and the other day, I skipped my lecture and just sat in the little garden behind the law building with a little plastic cup having a little moment of Daphne-introspection.

But most of all, I like sitting down for a couple of hours with a mug at a cafe with some good company. Most often it's just one person, sometimes two, but I strongly believe that sustaining an easy conversation over three hours with one mug is the best way to get to know someone.

If I had an ideal date*, it would probably have to involve coffee. Because if there's going to be any awkwardness, it'll be ironed out straight away once the cup is drained.

And sometimes companionable silence is a good thing.

I will give two examples here from personal experience- one, where I caught up with a friend in the city (and the coffee was absolutely terrible) and after four hours over one cup, we realised it had gotten dark and we hadn't even noticed, we were so caught up in the conversation. The other example was when I rather unwillingly accepted an offer for coffee (but I was being polite and couldn't say no) and I personally felt so uncomfortable that I wanted to run away screaming.

But that was a one in a million occurrence.

So you know what? Go through your Facebook contacts. Weed out the random ones, look at the ones that you love, the ones whom you're close to, the ones that you've lost contact with but still care for...and go get a coffee.

It beats a Wall Post any time.

Or a freaking Super Fun Wall Post.

Or whatever the fuck they're called.

And if it's a total disaster, I give you permission to spam my wall.

Just no Viagra offers, please.

*And by this, I mean any ideal date that DID NOT involve Jensen Ackles, Tom Welling or John Barrowman. Or all three at once...

Little Mucus Update

I just thought I'd give you a little update on my Week-Of-Unwanted-Contact-With-Other-People's-Bodily-Fluids.

Because one of my colleagues SNEEZED on me today.

And not just a general sneeze in my direction, I felt a disgusting splattering of wet droplets on my left cheek.

Did I freak out?

Of course.

I also might have shrieked something along the lines of, "I hate you!" but y'know, I didn't really mean it.

After he'd sneezed on me, after I'd recoiled in absolute horror, my assistant manager told me he'd take over my customer and to go and wash my face.

But I couldn't, because I had carefully-applied foundation on my left cheek that was also concealing a spot, so it was really a toss-up between vanity and hygiene.

So I dabbed water (oh so carefully) on my left cheek, hoping that it wouldn't make the foundation go all weird, and patted it dry with a paper towel, mentally reminding myself to disinfect my face in the shower when I got home.

(Be assured that cleanser and exfoliater was duly applied later that evening.)

First blood, then two days later, nose mucus in droplet form. And these things come in threes...

Why are people so disgusting?!

Bloody Hell

Customers are disgusting.

An Asian woman came in to buy a phone cable today. At the counter, I picked up the item and thought "Huh, why is this wet?"

And then the customer brushed some hair out of her eyes, and left blood on her forehead. And on her chin.

And I was about to say something, but then I looked down at my hands and realised that the wet stuff was in actual fact, her blood.

Her blood.

On my HANDS.

AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHH.

Then she realised she was bleeding. While I was mentally hyperventilating. At her blood. Smeared on MY HANDS.

AAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHH.

So the stupid twit had cut herself while cooking. And she hadn't realised it. And despite the fact that it was bleeding quite happily, and it must have hurt, she still hadn't realised it. And so not only did she get to smear some on her face, but also when she picked up the phone cable, thus transferring the blood to my hands. Oh, and the EFTPOS machine. And the pen she used to sign.

I said to her, quite calmly, "I'll go get you a Band-Aid from the First-Aid kit."

And then I ran to the staff room and did a Lady Macbeth, running to the sink and scrubbing furiously at my hands with antibacterial gel, because who knows what kinds of things people harbour in their haemoglobin?!

Plus, I was seriously, seriously grossed out.

Bodily fluids just do not belong on a store counter.

I got her a Band-Aid, then scampered away to the storeroom to have a hysterical bitch to my assistant manager, who kindly provided me with several strips of 70% isopropyl wipes so I could disinfect the counter.

I cleaned the EFTPOS machine, the counter, and the keyboards with that wonderful wonderful cleaning alcohol.

You probably think I'm being paranoid, but it was just feeling that wetness and then realising what it was that made it all the worse.

And the moral of the story today is: Beware customers with open wounds.

Also, some people are twits. But count that as obiter.

Update!

After several threats from Kristine (both physical and electronic, which could very well amount to a course of conduct in stalking under s21A of the Crimes Act) I am finally updating my blog.

Sorry.

However, the lack of blogging means that Kris hasn't been able to use it as an excuse to procrastinate, so really, SHE SHOULD BE THANKING ME when she gets her high distinction in Property Law at the end of the semester.

Unfortunately, I just haven't had time in the past few weeks- or to put it another way, saya tidak punya cukup waktu. (I've been trying to keep up what little language skills I have by chatting in Malay with my mother, but all we've been doing is insulting each other, then giggling hysterically.)

But yes...time management. Not going well.

If I'm not at uni, then I'm at work. If I'm not at work, then I'm banging my head on the large dining table with my laptop attempting to study. If I'm not banging my head on the large dining table with my laptop attempting to study, I'm standing in the kitchen with my head stuck in the pantry scavenging for food.

And the vicious cycle goes on.

And so, that leaves me here at 12:47 a.m still with my unfinished homework to print off and a little bundle of anxiety that likes to build up in my chest until I end up trying to get rid of it by panicking or hopping on one foot and sticking my head in the pantry again and wailing.

Because I am a mature young woman and I like to resolve my various personal crises in grown-up, mature ways.

Like wailing.

But yes...tomorrow I am screwed for my law tutorials. Oh, so screwed. How I wish the week were over...

A proper update will be forthcoming...

Days of Ugliness

I had an Ugly Day today.

I consider this profoundly unfair, as I already suffered through an Ugly Day yesterday, but it looks like that maybe Ugly Days, like many things, come in threes.

For the perpetually beautiful (and thus ignorant) people who have never had one, an Ugly Day is when you get up and look in the mirror and something akin to the monosyllable, "BLEEEAAARGH!!!" bursts forth upon seeing your hideous visage.

Then you close your eyes for two seconds.

Then you crack one eye open, just to make sure that what you saw wasn't a sleep-deprivation-induced hallucination.

If you still look horrible, then yep, it's an Ugly Day.

It's a combination of factors- bad skin, bad hair, bad make-up, painful application of corrective lenses, your favourite top is in the wash...and all you want to do is hide under the covers and shout a muffled defiance at the world.

So I had one yesterday, but luckily all I had was Torts (where I sat right up the back by myself in a little huddle where no one could look upon me and be turned to stone, Medusa-like) and my Spanish cultural class, which is generally in a darkened theatre.

I then went home, where Dad was setting up digital set-top box #2.

Except he didn't have any spare RF cables. I found that a bit hard to believe, considering the jungle of cables he keeps around. And Dad being Dad, just said: "Why don't you go and get me one now?"

Two main things wrong with that:

1. I was having an Ugly Day
2. There's nothing more loser-ish than going into work WHEN YOU HAVE A DAY OFF

Except I didn't really want to explain to Dad that I was having an Ugly Day, because in my opinion, Ugly Days are a purely feminine concept, and men just don't get why you're hiding in the house with your trackies and ugg boots all day and hissing at the prospect of human contact. Plus, men just go out and get things done regardless of whether they look shit or not.

But after 40 minutes of discussion, we finally settled upon getting a 2.5m cable and some spare TV coax solder heads, just as backup. Plus, Dad agreed to teach me to strip and solder coaxial cable, and we still haven't tried out his newest toy, a temperature-controlled soldering station.

After a really nasty bout of Daphne v Foundation, in which the defendant, Revlon Flex, would not apply properly to the plaintiff's face without drying it out, I slunk off to work. Looking like someone had rubbed sand on my cheeks. If I'd been able to sue a semi-liquid inanimate object, I would have cited emotional trauma.

After the initial "What are you doing at work on YOUR DAY OFF?" from the girls, and after "giving shit" to my boss, as he likes to call it, I got the RF plugs and cable and went home. But not before browsing for some new glasses frames, which was even more humiliating, as 99% of the frames looked like they were attacking my face instead of helping my little eyeballs see clearly.

Oh, the horrors.

Not to worry, I thought. Because tomorrow is a new and exciting day!!!

To quote Borat...

...NOT.

I woke up this morning- actually, strike that, it was sometime in the afternoon- padded to the mirror, and internally, I screamed.

That stupid healing purple spot on my forehead had decided to reverse the healing process so it looked like someone had squashed a munted blueberry on my face and stuck it there for all posterity. To add insult to injury, it had somehow procreated overnight and so I had two matching companions for the damn thing on my left cheek, and oh, what I would've given to have Photoshopped my face right then at that moment.

OK, Daphne.

We are not going out today.

Luckily, it was 'Reading Week' for English at uni. Which is pretty stupid, because I only have TWO CONTACT HOURS a week for that subject, so I just don't understand why a Reading Week (read: Bludge Week) is required. Not that I'm complaining, because I got to stay home and bemoan Ugly Day #2.

I was making a pumpkin soup in the afternoon, and I'd got it all nice and blended and smooth when I realised that I was missing cream.

"Dad, I need cream. And we're out of milk."

"Why don't you go get some?"

"Because it's an Ugly Day."

"It's a beautiful day outside."

"No, I know the weather's nice. But I am having an ugly day. I refuse to go out."

(Dad didn't really have a response for that. Probably too befuddled as to the illogical workings of the teenage female mind. Plus he'd already commented on the hideousness of The Spot earlier in the afternoon, so he probably did understand.)

"Awwww come on Dad. I went and got your RF cable for you yesterday didn't I? Your turn."

So Dad went and fetched my cream and my milk, and that was that. I am currently holed up at home until soccer tonight, but all of my friends there have seen me at some stage in my little pink and blue bunny pyjamas and if that isn't a trial of friendship I don't know what is, so I never really feel self-conscious around them at all. It's quite liberating.

I even think that I radiate some kind of negative electromagnetic energy on Ugly Days, like Jack Black in Be Kind Rewind- my phone froze when I tried to answer a call and I had to hold down the off button until it blinked off, and the home PC froze up completely last night as well and had to be manually shut down.

Even technology doesn't like reflecting my face in its LCD screens.

Oh, and you know what was playing as I got into my car yesterday?

"Unpretty" by TLC.

And that, Ms Morissette, is irony.