Life, the universe and ... oh, whatever ...

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

You can leave your hat on

… and you’d better remember to bring your brain as well!!

Last Thursday, when on my vacation in Germany, I decided to get on the train to Kulmbach to do some shopping. When in Germany I stay in my aunt and uncle’s flat in Untersteinach, this is about 6 km outside Kulmbach. It’s one stop with the train, and the trip lasts about 3 – 4 minutes.

There are trains leaving every hour, and also buses, about one every hour.
I got on the train in the morning, and went to Kulmbach as planned. Went to a book store and bought a couple of second-hand English books (I’ll write more about my holiday reading in another posting), bought some new clothes (of course I did, I’m a woman am I not, it is both physically and mentally impossible for me to go shopping when on vacation and not buy clothes!!) and then decided it was time to head back to Untersteinach. My watch said 1315 that meant that the train for Untersteinach that leaves a few minutes past every hour had just been missed. I walked over to the bus station, and the monitor said there would be a bus for Untersteinach at 1430 – great I thought, that’s only about 10 minutes – I’ll wait. 10 minutes later I was wondering: where’s the stupid bus? Checked the bus times and my watch again, and of course realized my mistake, I was there an hour to early.

Alright I thought, I’ll go to the grocery store, pick up a couple of beers and some other items for the evening, then head over to the railway station to get the next train that leaves a few minutes past the hour. I got to the railway station at 1350, checked the train times, and found out that I would go by the 1307 train, that would leave from platform 1. I sat down to read my book and to wait for the train. About 15 minutes later I noticed a train leaving from platform 4, in the direction of Untersteinach, and thought; hey, that’s weird! So, I looked at my watch and checked the times again – and for the second time that day realized my mistake. What I had seen was the 1404 train leaving for Untersteinach, now there was another hour till the next train! At this point I actually considered grabbing a cab to get back home, but as I had already now bought a train-ticket that I wouldn’t be able to use – that seemed like a rather costly solution – just because I’m an idiot!

Well, now I was quite sure that there would be a bus leaving from the bus station at 1430, so I went back there – finally managed to be in the right place at the right time – and was back home at the flat at about 1445 – only about 1 ½ our later than I could’ve been!Some days I think I really shouldn’t be allowed to go outside because I might end up not only forgetting where I live or where I’m going to – but also who I am!!!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home