Black Friday

On the morning of Friday the 13th I watched the Breakfast telly hosts sneering at people who are suspicious about the date. I had to agree. Intelligent people don't hold out much belief in 'old wives tales' and old fashioned suspicious beliefs. One hour later I was begging at the Air New Zealand counter after having been mistakenly booked on a flight that had already departed. Could happen to anyone at anytime. So could an error that meant there was no rental car for me to pick up when I got to Auckland making us an hour late for our meeting. Nothing to do with it being Black Friday.
We were meeting with advertising agencies – you know those companies where the prerequisite to working there is that you are blonde, blue eyed and incredibly slim – and that’s just the guys. Attempting to behave incredibly cool, I got my foot caught in my handbag and went head first into the door in front of a boardroom of ‘Joe-cools.’
Back at the airport later that day there was a gate change and I ended up trying to board a flight to Christchurch instead of Wellington. As I reached down to get my boarding pass from my bag my finger smashed into the skirting board and a large wooden splinter rammed itself right down the length of my fingernail. Dizzy with pain, I heard my name being called to please board immediately. I tried to break into a run when the heel snapped off my shoe. I hobbled onto a plane full of annoyed waiting passengers. By this time my finger was swelling in red rage at the foreign object that had slammed into it. I spent the flight dipping my finger into a warm cup of tea in an effort to ease the pain – it didn’t! Black Friday? Surely just coincidence.
Back in Wellington I took my broken shoes off and walked through the airport barefoot, splashing into a freezing puddle in the dark outside.
By the time I got home, a throbbing mess, I was bundled off to the after hours medical centre to have the splinter extracted. The Dr said it wouldn’t be as painful as childbirth. The only difference was it didn’t take quite as long. $65 and a $5 packet of antibiotics later, I am typing this blog with one hand.
in the hope that I never have such a tale to write about Black Friday ever again.