An Expensive Something To Laugh About

I am questioning the logic of writing this post but there are times when I can't take myself seriously and am glad that I have a good enough sense of humour to laugh at my own expense.

So ... here it goes. I arrived home from England last Monday. Leaving at 2 in the morning to get a flight at 8:30 was not a pleasant journey. By the time I got back to the intense heat in Krakow, all I was fit for, was sleep.

With a flight due the next night, I decided to catch up with some friends in the evening, which was probably not the greatest idea since I was till suffering from a cold, but still it was nice to catch up.

The next day was a day of preparation for my flight to Georgia - a non-event of a day as these days tend to be. It was a case of patiently waiting until it was time to leave. I got out to the airport with plenty of time to spare and contemplated on how best to pass the four hours until the flight was due. Reading, eating, coffee, reading, juice and more reading seemed to work.

I had a look up at the information board just out of curiosity and that's when everything went wrong. I examined it extremely carefully but my flight was not there. I checked the ticket and the date and everything seemed fine - 30th of July but then I realised why it was not on the electronic board, the date was correct but the plane had already left at 00:50 earlier that morning.

This is not the first time something like this has happened to me. I have waited at an airport one day earlier to welcome my cousin, I have confused 6 am with 6 pm while getting a ferry from Dublin to Wales, I once bought 5 train tickets for our group of 4 and I have also booked flights to the wrong airport.

So what did I do? I contemplated getting another flight to anywhere but then decided to retreat back to Krakow. I took a bus to the train station in Katowice and thought again about going somewhere different. The shame of returning to Krakow seemed too great. Wrocław, Warsaw - these were two cities that came to mind but then I decided that it was best to return to the city I had started from and regroup.

All the buses had gone and the queue was enormous. I'm guessing they were in line to get tickets for  a festival as they looked like the type with range of quirky styles from punk to a hippy look that seemed out of place in the modern train station in Katowice. When I finally reached the top of the queue, I bought a ticket for the next train to Krakow, which was due in over 5 hours. Patience was needed once more. I amused myself by reading again and going to an Internet cafe to book another flight for later in the week. There was one option to fly from Warsaw to Georgia the next day but I chose the later one from Krakow, which was half the price.

Patience was the quality, which was once again put to the test on the train journey home. I slept for most of it thankfully.

So I am still going to Georgia but will have to be patient once more. As for these mistakes that prove to be very costly, I feel a bit resigned to the fact that I will make them again but at least they give me a reason to write.