Off Topic With Ashley

I woke up peachy and fresh that Saturday morning.

It was a little past eight o’clock, but I squandered forty-five minutes reading in bed so when I finally got up I only had half an hour to get ready. I would have been fine if I didn’t have a last minute freakout about what I was wearing.

As a side note, the new pair of shoes I recently bought as a supposedly “go-anywhere smartish casual” affair turned out to be more of an “oh god why did I have to buy shoes which are primarily green and earthy colours when I want to wear purple today” affair; a difficult situation I’m sure anyone can appreciate. Thankfully I matched them with a creamy white belt at the last minute, which sounds odd but actually looked pretty good.

I missed my train for want of style.

Not entirely unperturbed, I drove to Virginia railway station because the next train on the Banyo line was going to take an eternity to get me to the city. I arrived in the CBD almost entirely on time.

I’d planned myself a big day out that day. In the morning I was going to attend a Pirate Party meeting to gauge whether the Australian branch of the popular political franchise is something I want to get myself involved in. After lunch I was going to meet up with Matt, and we were going to hang out until the 350 event in New Farm Park. Then I was planning on attending a birthday dinner party at around seven. It was an action packed plan to be sure.

The day started with a bad omen foreshadowing things to come: I couldn’t find the meeting I was supposed to be attending.

The email sent out simply stated “Brisbane Square Library” which while quite an accurate address, was more than a little vague considering the place is three storeys tall and chock full of nooks to hide in. This was compounded by the fact that the woman at the front counter didn’t know what she was doing, and couldn’t tell me which meeting room had actually been registered.

I eventually found the three-strong delegation huddled in a corner of the one room I didn’t check. I presume this was some divine power deliberately screwing with me.

It was an interesting meeting to be sure. The agenda was a bit open-ended and while there were a few good ideas shared, I’m not sure whether the actual party is going to gain any momentum with just four dudes and some fliers.

It only lasted an hour which caught me a bit off guard, and subsequently left me with a whole bunch of time to kill before meeting up with Matt. I bought a can of Cola Brand™ cola and after discovering I only had three dollars fifteen left to last me the entire day, I figured it might be prudent to head home and transfer some money to my card.

This is a tricky procedure involving encryption and keys and all manner of things I don’t have access to from an Internet cafe. It’s a bad system, but until I can remember my account number and overly complex password I’m stuck with it.

I headed straight home on the Shorncliffe line, and forgot to pick up the car at Virginia.