The Strange Case Of The Baking Tray

It has been a very strange day today.

Being as it is friday and a bit of schadenfreude always makes people smile, I thought I'd give your weekends a boost by telling you about it.

As those of you who follow me on Twitter and those of you who are my friends on Facebook will know I was without mobile internet yesterday. It was horrible. Because of my Twitter addiction there was someone who actually emailed to see if I was alright because it was unlike me to be so quiet!

See, what happened was that Virgin hadn't put my Virgin Mobile minutes or data allowance on when they did my monthly refresh.

So I rang them. The lady was very nice and took the one package off and put the new one on manually. Which was lovely. But my internet stopped working. And yes I am enough of an asshole to be distraught at the loss of mobile web.

I admit it. Freely. Move on.

So I rang back and spoke to nice lady number two. And they are all lovely. She told me that she had activated the web but it might take 24 hours to come back. What I should do is a hard reboot now and then... Her: 'do you know what a hard reboot is?' Me: 'I'm a Blackberry owner. Of course I know.' This should reactivate the web.

So I did exactly that. Over and over again. And still nothing. And still I was without internet on my phone. Distraught. Bereft. Well not quite. I was fully expecting it to come back this morning. It didn't.

So, I'm on the 7.37 from Redcar East to Newcastle and I keep trying. I try and try until 8.50 when the 24 hours was up. Then I rang back. I went through to technical this time where the man tells me that the nice lady didn't do the right bit and he will have my internet up and running in a jiffy. Which bless him he did. I was very happy.

Then it all went a bit wrong.

I found the Metro bought my ticket and got on the train, feeling pretty chuffed with myself. I was tweeting and facebooking and blog reading and all was right with the world. Till it occurred to me that while I was talking to the lovely Steve from Virgin that I'd got off the train without my suitcase.

Bugger! At least I had Google back so I could get the number for Newcastle station right? Wrong. Could I find it? Could I fuck.

So I asked the biggest train geek I know and will always be grateful to the lovely Sam Harrison for using his wily ways to procure the number for me.

So. I rang Newcastle Station who said they didn't have it but did give me the number for Northern Rail. (By the way Ruth from Northern Rail, whatever they are paying you isn't nearly enough)

My case had not been cleared off by the naughty conductor. And it had gone to Carlisle. That train was then going back to Newcastle. Might I prevail upon the lovely conductor (who was wearing a big old RMT badge) to bring it back to Newcastle for me asked me. I can ask him says lovely Ruth but it's against policy. Insurance issues apparently.

I thought I was going to cry. My straighteners were in that case. I have spares at home, but they're shite. This is why they are spares. Lovely Ruth must have heard the catch in my voice as she said she'd see what she could do.

Then I broke my shoe. It was un wearable and un repairable. I had a spare pair. They were in my case. Which was in Carlisle.

So I was walking around barefoot. In Newcastle. In a meeting. Where the reps didn't really know me well. And things got a little heated. Hard to project authority when you are barefoot and the Chair announces to the meeting that you are waiting for a call to retrieve your underwear.

For fuck's sake.

Of course that call came right when the Chair said 'Dee, would you like to update us on the pilot scheme please?'

St Ruth of Northern Rail then told me that lovely conductor was bringing my case back to Newcastle. Yay!!!

Meeting continued and it was as meetings can be. Long. Contentious. Frustrating in parts but worth attending and ultimately very productive.

And as the Chair said 'Dee, would you like to give us the Group position on this policy please?'. My phone went again. St Ruth. Again. And she told me that they now had my case. And that it had been opened and checked at Carlisle and everyone, both at the Northern Rail offices at Newcastle and Carlisle wanted to know why there was a baking tray in it.

I hope the sainted Northern Rail staff are still laughing at the fact that I carry it because I am worried about my straighteners scorching surfaces. They were certainly laughing as lovely Ruth relayed this to them.

They laughed even harder when I turned up barefoot. And when I opened my case to get my spare shoes out and they actually saw the baking tray. Well, I get to use the word apoplectic here I think. Yep, that about describes it.

But you know, the way I was handled and the fact that St Ruth went above and beyond the call of duty meant that I didn't mind them laughing at the absurdity of it all and I laughed along with them.

I hope my day has amused you too.

I have my case and internet back thanks to people on the telephone. The meeting today was about Contact Centres.

I hope as you laugh that you think about how much crap these good people have to take and take some time to remember this next time you have reason to need them.