A day to remember - or forget!

Isn't it strange how, now and again, you get a day when everything goes wrong? I don't know about you, but I'm sure I get more of those than I deserve. I get one maybe every month or two, whereas the other kind - the ones that bring nothing but peace, joy and satisfaction - come only once or twice a year at best. Nah, let's get real here - once or twice a decade is more like it!

Today, I had an appointment at one of the hospitals here in Perth. The public health system is underfunded and probably understaffed as well, so errors and misunderstandings are not uncommon. This was an appointment made ages ago, and as soon as I received the notice I phoned to say that Mondays aren't good for me because I teach dance then. Outpatients Direct, the mob in charge of the bookings, said they would try to get the appointment changed and I would hear about it in due course. What I received was another copy of the same notice - Monday, 31 October at 11.00AM.

'Oh well,' I thought. 'Perhaps they can't change it. I'll just have to cancel the dance class.' However, my students are dead keen on their work and they agreed to practise on their own today, while I went to the hospital. So I plotted out my journey - three rides (bus, train, train and a fair walk at the end) taking just over an hour each way.

Perhaps I should explain here that I do not drive. I did try to learn once, but after putting my then husband's treasured Jaguar into a ditch, nose down, I decided that a tactical withdrawal was in order, and I never tried again. In our society, non-drivers are rare, and not being able to drive might almost be considered a disability. However, I don't think I would ever have been more than a mediocre driver, at best: the kind that gets women drivers a bad name among certain males of the species.

Eventually, I got to the hospital all right, but do you think I could find the relevant department? Of course not. The sprawling layout of single-story buildings that constitutes the outpatients section covers an entire suburban block on its own, and of course all the buildings look alike. My notice had a map on the back, but whichever way I turned the paper, I could not find the right way into the right section. Eleven o'clock came and went and I was still lost. I asked for directions, and of course with the cheerful confidence of people who know their way around, various staff members pointed me in one wrong direction after another. Finally, more by good luck than good management, I stumbled across the right building, only to find that yes, the original appointment had, in fact, been cancelled and that I would eventually receive notice of a new time, probably in January.

This is starting to remind me of the song about why Murphy's not at work today, so I'll stop griping now. But I do hope my lovely dancing ladies had a better time than I did this morning!