The Bag

Two days ago I woke and sat up in a split second and hissed, “The Bag”.

The night before, when we arrived home from the bar, did some munchies and chewed the fat of the day while a DVD played in the background, we did not once think of ‘the Bag’ and yet, after a good night’s sleep, it was the first thought of the day.

I jumped out of bed, picked myself up off the floor and sure enough, ‘the Bag’ was not in its normal resting place. With failing hope, I searched the living room and the shoe stand, but alas, ‘the Bag’ was nowhere to be found.

I told the guys as we arrived at the bar after a long day’s computer pounding, NOT to let me forget my bag, in the feint hope that one of them would save me should I forget. Certainly there was no blame or admonishment due, as the bag was solely my responsibility.

There then followed a series of groans, as I remembered what was IN ‘the Bag’. First groan was for the camera and lens. Then a major groan for my laptop which contained details of my life, leaving me wide open to identity fraud. On the subject of identity, I then groaned as I remembered that my passport was in the pocket too. At the closing stages of sorting out my one year working VISA is a very bad time to lose the passport.

I sat down in front of the TV to try and take my mind off things and groaned again, as I could not read the TV remote because I did not have my glasses. Never mind, a cup of coffee, groan, coffee is in the bag.

It was an extremely long day, as we knew that the bar did not open until 6pm, which meant no one would be there much before 5pm.

I contacted the British Consulate and found that an emergency travel document could be obtained that would clear me back to the UK, but the UK trip was the only way to get a new passport, major groan. I continued to groan all day long as I kept thinking about all the problems. The boss leant me his spare glasses, which were only slightly better than nothing, a cause of lots of groans.

Finally, mid-afternoon, Dan (boss) called the bar and got through. He quickly got one of the girls to take the phone before the bar manager hung up, not speaking English of course.

YES! – he had the bag and I could go around and pick it up now. Then followed a spirited rendition of ‘the Dad Dance’.

I offered a generous reward, but the staff would not take it, so I guess we will be drinking in there again, for sure. I can’t remember experiencing such relief!

Dave