Going Stir Crazy

Its raining again. Really heavily now. We have put on long sleeve tops for the first time since leaving America and we have even bought umbrellas! I was quite enjoying shouting "Who killed Kenny?" and running through the streets with a plastic bag on my head with a whole punched through for my face (hence the South Park quote). I thought I was quite clever fashioning a rain cover with my blue peter like skills. I'm not sure that Jo found me as funny as I found myself though - so she suggested that we buy umbrellas. We knew deep down that we would have to surrender to the weather sooner or later and admit defeat and buy one. Unfortunately, today is that sad day.

I really am begining to think that I am not supposed to go to Buenos Aires. I don't know if I have mentioned this before whilst blogging but I have tried to buy a ticket 9 times now and had no success. I have entered one travel agents four times, another one three times and tried to buy a ticket on expedia twice. The first time on expedia I was faced with a system crash. The second time the system would not let me have the tickets delivered to an address outside of the USA - and there were no etickets available. The first time in the first travel agents my credit card didn't authorise the transaction. This has happened before (when I was buying the Topaz ring) but when, on that occasion, the lady rang through to my bank - they simply wanted to ask me security questions to check that it was me. I tried to explain this to the travel agent and asked him to ring the number on the back of my card ........ but he said that he couldn't make phone calls for customers. Wasn't the phone call for them - indirectly? I tried to hint towards the economics of this - the price of a phone call weighed against the value of the ticket I was trying to buy from them .......but I don't think they quite got what I was saying (I decided to follow Adam Smith's Laissez Faire approach to economics ....... and simply leave them alone - never mind leave the economy alone). Showing true persistence, I tried asking another assistant but his excuse was that they were unable to make international calls from their phones. Have you ever heard of anything so stupid? An international travel agent who can't make international calls.

unwillingly, but due to not being able to find an alternative, I returned to the same agents with cash in an attempt to steer clear of any credit card or telephone fiascos. However, on that day I was told that they were only open for information and didn't have a system up an running.
This carried on for a further two visits.

I then found another travel agent - but on both trips to this one I have again been faced with system failure! I am nearing a system failure myself I fear. I really need to get this god damn ticket. I have a booking for four weeks of language school in Buenos Aires and I am meeting Jose there. Is it too far to walk?

A further contributing factor to my venture down stir crazy avenue is this blog. I have battled with uploading photos to this site about three times now. I am admitting defeat now and I am not going to try ever again. It's not good for my health - in more ways than one. The stress caused by the frustration is at dangerous levels and the near heart attacks brought on by finding random porn pictures saved on the c drive of the net cafe computers are enough to finish of any self respecting woman! I give in.

This morning I actually caught myself thinking that it would be nice to amend an inadequate contract today. Its the rain - its getting to me. There's not much you can do in these outdoor based counties when you can't go outdoors. My brain was feeling idle and I really did sit on the end of my bed thinking about getting my teeth into amending a few clauses with threatening red ink in a teacher like manner. I've already had one request for legal advice from a friend - maybe that little exposure was enough to reignite the cindering ashes of that part of my brain. Maren - you are now to blame for the incessant taping of my foot and galloping brain! Maybe I'll write a book. I have already written a list of the books that I am going to write - for the sake of writing them and occupying my mind. Not in pursuit of any J K Rowland like fame. I don't think I could take the rejection of the reviews. Most people are their own worst critic ( I hear them say) - but I've always rather liked "bigging myself up", as they say in the Hip Hop world. I don't care for criticism.

You will all be pleased to hear that I am stuffing my face with piles of food that would rival the surplus mountains of the EC. What else is there to do except go from restaurant to net cafe to restaurant. When its raining outside its so much more tempting to stay inside and have three courses - for each meal.

I am now staring at the small girl beside me with strange furry animals tied into her hair. She is only about five years old so I suppose the fashion police would let her off. She has pretty little eyes but a devilish smile. I have no doubt that she would swipe my belongings from this desk if I got up to get a cup of water from the internationally recognised plastic dispenser in the corner. I'll leave it and keep guard of my belongings. In my experience, children are often junior members of highly organised criminal fraternities. This is due to the fact that most countries' legal systems share the same child friendly loop hole in that under tens (may vary country to country) are unable to be reprimanded in any binding or deterring way. Beware the under tens!

Ha ! Its five o'clock - that means I have something to do. My laundry will be ready from the laundrette. Oh the glamour of it.

S xx