It's a little after 5am and I can't sleep. Presently I am sitting in bed in the spare room of my girlfriend's family home in rural Oxfordshire because she's struggling with a nasty cough/cold and doesn't want to infect me by hacking up over me while we sleep. Not that I'd worry about getting sick, just being with her over the holidays is enough to keep me happy.
Nearly didn't happen though.
I fell asleep last night around 6am, only intending to get a couple of hours sleep - a busy work shedule meant most of my Christmas shopping was left until the very last minute. I overslept, getting out of bed shortly before 11:30.
After showering, packing and cleaning up my room I headed into Exeter city centre around 2pm, spending the next couple of hours picking out presents for Amy and my family, and being quite proud of my haul. I even sent Amy a text telling her how proud I was and how happy she'd be with her presents. What is it they say about pride before a fall?
Returning home at 4pm, I fished the keys out of my pocket, and it dawned on me ... I had picked up my work keys when I'd left the house. Fine if I wanted to let myself into the club after-hours, but not good when I needed to get into the house, wrap presents, cook and eat dinner, and all before my 6pm train to Banbury via Reading and Oxford.
I rang the doorbell, with no response. I called my housemate Vicky's mobile, which rang through to her voicemail. I didn't have my other housemate's number, but he rarely gets home before 6pm anyway. So I walk around to the back garden and see if there's any other way into the house. The back door was locked, but the bathroom window is slightly ajar. Unfortunately, it was also on the second floor. After climbing onto the shed roof, I realised that even if I could reach and open the window, I'd never be able to climb in.
So I called my landlord. His phone went straight to voicemail. Not good. I call his father, who tells me he'll get hold of him and get him to come over to let me in. Forty-five minutes later and no word, I start getting a little bit panicky, and start considering smashing a window to get in. Thankfully, my landlord then calls to say he'll be there by 5pm, which he follows through on, arriving shortly before with a bunch of keys to every door in the house. Problem solved!
Or not quite. Ten minutes later we discover that none of the keys work. Cursing follows. But my luck changes when Rob's bedroom light turns on, signalling that while the landlord and I were making our way around to the back door, he'd let himself in through the front. Once inside I rushed around throwing the last of my packing into my suitcase and high-tailing it out the front door, and catching a cab to the train station.
Once on the train I started to relax - I was on my way, sitting in an empty first-class carriage and wrapping presents. The first leg of the journey went smoothly, arriving in Reading just after 8pm. Then I realised it wasn't my day - my connecting train to Oxford, scheduled to leave at 8:22, had been cancelled, as was the following two trains afterwards, resulting in a 45-minute wait for the next available train, which had no first-class carriage - partial refund on my tickets are in Order I think.
Upon arrival in Oxford I was pleased to learn that the connecting train to Banbury not only hadn't been cancelled, but had arrived early. I found myself a quiet spot on the train, and waited for departure. Then the engine stopped. Twenty minutes after the scheduled departure time, I was joined by a very agitated rastafarian-looking fellow, who'd obviously been spending much of the evening having a merry old tme. Up went the volume on my iPod.
Eventually we were informed there had been a problem with the train crew, resulting in the forty-minute delay, and were on our way. Amy was waiting for me at the station, and didn't miss the oppertunity to make a sarcastic comment about my timekeeping being so terrible it even affects other people. After briefly meeting her parents for the first time, which went really rather well, we turned in for bed.
And then I woke up again at 3:30 and couldn't get back to sleep. It's been a weird old day!
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