Official News page 4

MY WEEK FROM HELL

by Hazed

I’ve had a helluva week. This article is me venting about my problems. It may not be of much interest to anyone else, but writing it makes me feel better!

Last Saturday, on a trip to go to the theatre with a friend, my bag was stolen while I enjoyed a sandwich in a central London cafe. There went my wallet containing cash and all my credit cards, my house and car keys, my iphone, my glasses and my kindle.

As I keep telling myself, it’s only stuff. Nobody died. There was nothing of irreplaceable sentimental value in the bag.

But sorting out the aftermath is such a hassle!

The first problem, of course, was that the theatre tickets were in my bag. Thank goodness for technology: because I had bought the tickets online, the box office was able to find my purchase and reprint the tickets, so for a few hours while watching the show I was able to forget about my problems.

(For those that are interested, the play was called Absent Friends, a comedy by great British playwright Alan Ayckbourn.)

After the play, my friend lent me enough money to travel but the problem was getting into my flat. Luckily, Alan had a spare set of keys. But he lives on the other side of London from me, so I had to get the tube to Chiswick in West London to get the keys, then back to my home in Surrey Quays, in South-east London. Oh well, at least it gave me a chance to see his new flat!

And then the hassle started. Having reported the cards stolen, I had to wait for new ones to be sent to me. Meanwhile, the only way to get any money was to visit the bank and cash a cheque. I also had to order a new pair of (expensive) glasses, order a replacement driving license, order a replacement season ticket for the London underground (and in the meantime pay for daily tickets), get the locks to my flat changed, leave my car with a mechanic to get the keys recoded...

But before all that, the most important thing was to replace my phone. If you’d asked me a week ago how important having a mobile phone was, I’d have said, “Not very”. I hadn’t realised just how reliant on my iPhone I had become. I use it for so much more than making calls: it’s my music player, I listen to the radio and catch up on programs I have missed, it’s my map, my calendar, my calculator, my camera and my food diary, I use it to check bus times in the morning, and I play word games with my friends. And no, foolishly I had not enabled the “Find My iPhone” feature. Believe me, I have on the new phone!

As if all this hassle wasn’t enough, on Tuesday morning, while running around sorting out replacements for all my missing stuff, I got stuck in the lift at my local shopping centre. Enclosed spaces are no fun at all!

So I am not a happy bunny.

And now I’ve finished moaning, it’s back to our regularly scheduled news bulletin.

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