I don't like it when people say the world is out to get them. It is blatantly illogical to attribute intent and malice to what is clearly pure chance. However, while statistically a dice thrown repeatedly should land on each side an approximately equal number of times, it is still perfectly feasible that you could score a one twenty times in a row. Thus, while my friend Spike could, as I told her once, fall into a bucket of shit and come up smelling of freesias, I am continually dogged by set-backs and frustration. When your every endeavour, large or small, is thwarted by other peoples' incompetency, idiocy or plain old spite, it does begin to feel like the aforementioned planet has it in for you.
A simple attempt to place an order with a company with a reputation for reliability ends, for many, in the hassle-free delivery of the purchased items. For me, it will hopefully still end in delivery, but it takes a detour via random order cancellation, lying customer services personnel and the replacement of a four hour delivery slot with a seven hour delivery slot. I grit my teeth.
Then I try to book a removals company. I make an online request for Saturday 5th November. They call me.
Man: Did you want Saturday 3rd or Monday 5th?
Me: No, Saturday 5th.
Man: Saturday's the 3rd.
Me: Oh. (check calender) Wait, no it's not, it's the 5th.
Man: (patronisingly) I promise you it's the 3rd. I'm looking at a calendar.
Me: So am I. Are you looking at November?
Man: (angrily) Yes, of course!
Me: 2011?
Man: ................Oh.
I book a different removal company and start grinding my teeth.
Next I wangle getting off work an hour early in exchange for working through my lunchbreak, so that I can go and collect the keys to my new flat. I hike up the high street, looking for the estate agent's. After a while I spot a rare street number over a shop door and realise I've gone too far. How did I manage to miss the office? I backtrack, and eventually spot it; with the signs removed, whitewashed windows and no furniture. What?! I call them. They've moved offices and not bothered to tell me, or to update the contact information in their email signatures for that matter. I now haven't got time to to get all the way across the borough before they close, and have wasted hours of my evening travelling around London to no purpose. I bang my head against a brick wall and inadvertently knock loose several teeth.
Can anyone blame me for feeling a little like the world is setting challenges for me at times?
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