I am in absolutely the foulest mood I have ever been in. (This story is brought to you by the cost of living crisis.)
I was out all day on a very long trek to pick up some free stuff I needed from a Facebook ad. I had to take two buses and it took over two hours to get there.
The woman giving it away told me (which she had not said in the ad) that it was to go as a job lot - either I took all of it or none of it. Of course everyone always assumes you drive, which I cannot afford to, so I just pointed out to her that I was holding as much as I could physically carry. She asked if I could come back for the rest. I said yes, but I won't - if she can't give it away free, she should pay someone to remove it, not insist a stranger on Facebook take it away for free when they don't need it. The stuff was very, very heavy and I had to carry it myself in Bags For Life that were slowly splitting at the seams.
Anyway, I had to walk a long way, stopping every few yards because the objects were so heavy. By the time I got back to my home town, I had to immediately go to work. I work in an office after-hours, when everyone else has gone home. I still had the heavy stuff and felt so sweaty and gross, and I had torn several holes in my skirt and lost one of my rings, which is a real bummer.
I did my work, then finished about 10pm. The bags were so heavy that I called a taxi from my office reception phone. I waited, then it rang to say the taxi was there. I went outside. The address I had give was VERY clear, the office has the number written on the door and it's a well known street. But the cabbie had parked up at a pub on the opposite side of the street, about fifty yards away. I couldn't run to him because I could hardly walk a few feet carrying the luggage. I stood there waving at him for several minutes, but he was talking to another guy all that time, who eventually got in the cab and drove off, even as I waved my arms at them.
Another cab from the same company also pulled up at the same pub, so I thought maybe the first one had been a mistake and this one was mine. Same thing: bags too heavy to carry and too valuable to leave, so I was jumping up and down waving, trying to get his attention. Eventually a load of people came out of the pub and got in and drove off, so that one must have been theirs.
A cab drove by with its light on, so I hailed it clearly, but it drove past me anyway.
My phone is very badly smashed at the minute. Which I'm also very pissed off about, because I paid £75 for it to have a new screen, which then broke three days after the guy installed it! I have never had a phone screen shatter before, and I didn't do anything to shatter it. The guy obviously used cheap shitty glass, but I'm £75 out of pocket and now my phone totally doesn't work. It blinks and sometimes the keypad works and sometimes it doesn't. I tried very hard to ring the taxi company, but I couldn't. I tried very hard to contact them online, but I couldn't. The big thing is, I am not allowed to go back into the office after I have left, because it's high security stuff in there, and if you leave, then log back in in the middle of the night, security are going to flag it as a big deal and it can become a whole HR thing.
So I waited on the street. I saw many many taxis going by, but the ones with lights on all drove down other turn offs, so never went past me. I fiddled on my broken phone for so, so long. I was there as the street went from busy to quiet. Quite a few weird looking men walked past me really slowly, eyeing me up. I really wanted to go back inside, but I knew I would get in trouble.
Eventually I just had to go back into the office, which I am likely to get a bollocking for, when my boss finds out. I called the taxi company and told the operator what had happened. I was weary, but didn't raise my voice or swear or anything. The woman was absolutely AWFUL. She told me with a straight face that the taxis record said it had picked me up and dropped me home. She said that like I was at home and too stupid to have noticed it.
I said, "But it didn't, I'm still here."
THEN she said that her records showed that I'd been seen talking to a driver from a rival taxi company, and I got into that taxi. Wtf? I just told her I hadn't.
She said, in a really rude, dismissive way, "Well I don't know why it's taken you this long to call us." You know when people say "I don't know why you did that", but it's obvious they're implying that you did it for some dishonest reason?
I said that my phone was badly broken, and I had had to come back into the office to use the office phone, which I am not allowed to do, because the security system is complex and you're not meant to leave, then come back again.
She said she would send a taxi, but "Just make sure you're there." I said "I was there!" and put the phone down.
I am so fucking angry. I know I'll get advice like "Why did you give them your money after that", etc, but I was dog tired, dirty, my clothes were ripped, it was scary outside, and I'm autistic so I can get very badly affected by stuff like this, to a damaging degree. I just had to get home asap, because I couldn't even think straight.
So I got in their next taxi, which actually knew how to read the number on a door. I absolutely fucking hated today. I am so, so angry. It doesn't sound like much of a day when I come to type it out, but I am raving mad, and I know I'm going to get in trouble at work over all this shit, and I know I have to fork out £75 to get a new screen for my phone, which is a huge financial strain because I'm below the poverty line. I don't even have a pair of shoes that fit and don't have holes. My dress is probably a write off. I feel absolutely horrific. I wish I could scream and yell, but I don't suppose that would solve anything!
Thanks, I really needed to get this out.
/rant
So if you see a short, fat, red headed, middle aged woman on social media anywhere having a melt down, it was me and please don't let me know as I am already in hell over it.
SO NERVOUS it’s my first full time job interview!!!
really pleased! Like I said, not the job or pay I wanted or know I can get but it’s a foot in the door and my first full time role
proud of myself, although I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t crapping myself with anxiety over the thought of long 12 hour shift patterns and night shifts
."