It appears over the last few days I’ve become some sort of terrible human being. I’m not sure what’s changed me, but after laughing at the man with the funny walk the other day, I then ruined a cab driver’s evening because his accent was so strong I couldn’t understand him, or therefore find him and it was raining, so I buggered off. This might not seem that unreasonable I suppose, but when these sorts of things occur I spend ages wondering about the poor bloke sitting in his cab waiting for me to appear at the window so he can earn his keep, whilst unbeknownst to him, I’m in someone else’s cab all snug and on my way. Its a mean form of rejection. Almost like cheating, but in the transport world. If I ever booked that cab again, would he accept me back? Or would he think that now I’ve lied to him once I could so easily do it again? To be fair, the chances of going back to Hatfield for any reason are slim enough as it is, and so I think I should be ok. But now I’ll just be remembered as ‘Tiernan, the man who wasn’t there,’ which actually, is pretty cool. I’d like to be known as the ‘Man Who Wasn’t There’. It has an air of mystery and intrigue. Especially if it relates to someone who was there, but no one knew it. I suppose the title is only shit if its used in relation to friend’s birthdays or important family things. Hmm. Maybe its not a great moniker to have. Either way, that cab driver probably hates me and would hate my face but he never saw it.
Not entirely my fault though. Hertfordshire University is set over three campuses and no one seems to know which one is which. On the way there the cab driver insisted he knew which bit I was going to, and dropped me off in the pouring rain at a place that seemed ‘uni’ like. I mean like a University. Not the tiny horned horse from Dungeons and Dragons. That would be all magical and also hugely unhelpful in terms of getting to my gig. Unless Dungeon Master also appeared and gave me a riddle as to where I was meant to be which I could then try and work out but ultimately never find it or get home. Saying that, any of that sort of mayhem would have been better than dumping my unprepared for rain self on the opposite side of the campus to where I was meant to be, with only ten mins to go till I needed to be on stage. Various students gave me directions that all seemed to involve going up ramps or down stairs or under a bridge. There were points where I expected to climb through tunnels and scale ‘The Wall’ like some sort of Wipeout challenge.
Turning up at the gig, walking onstage like a bedraggled soaked through bear, and ultimately just being stared at by 60 apathetic bored students is by far, not my favourite way to start a Wednesday. I ploughed through got off, raced out, booked a cab and then told them exactly where to meet me. I asked a student which campus we were on and he told me the name, I gave it to the cab office and ultimately, their cabbie ended up at the wrong site. Brilliant. Then followed me running around the campus I was on, in the rain, to find a cabbie that was on a completely different campus trying to find me, in the rain. His constant phone calls with extremely strong accent and bad signal meant I kept misinterpreting what he’d said and his repetition of ‘Hatfield’ combined with my ‘yes, I am wearing a hat’ responses, meant it was never going to be.
This combined with the train journey there, where we were told the train left from platform 2, then whilst on the train were told it was the other train on the same platform. Then when the entire train full of people had sat down, we were told the train we needed was now on Platform 0 ( a platform that surely, due to its name, should not exist? Platform nothing. It is less than the 1st platform? How can we possibly stand or wait for a train on a platform that has a value of 0? We should be waiting for ever) and so the entire train load of people had to move again. No one was certain we’d ever get there.
Today I have the car again. I will grumble about the M1 and the M6. I will hate trying to find somewhere to park, yet all the while, I will be dry and can wail along to music I like and will ultimately know where to find my car at the end of the night. Though I will be in Birmingham so it’s possible it may have moved when I return to it. Ha. Joke Brum types. But also not.
