Day 29 -Wake Up Call

As you will know, if you’ve been a keen follower of grumpy, I am not the best sleeper in the world, this is doubly true on my first night in a hotel room or if my alarm is set for stupid o’clock or indeed as last night, both. So I was pleasantly surprised that I fell asleep and stayed asleep last night despite knowing that the alarm would come a calling at 6.22 and despite being in a small, pokey hotel room in the bowels of Hotel Mercure in Ostrava. (It’s nice to know that even the posh hotels have cheap seats.)

I was dreaming of those Elizabethan girls when alarm went off, or didn’t. Because despite trying to hit the snooze button, it wasn’t my alarm that ripped me from my sleep but a ringing phone.

No one expects a ringing phone at 5.56 and a ringing phone at 5.56 is not pleasant. In the 3 seconds it takes to answer it, 79 disaster scenarios have shot through your mind from dead parents to dead parrots. So, with a sense of sleepy trepidation I slide my finger across the screen and groggily said hello.

‘Hello this is Joan from Lufthansa is that Gareth Daveeez?’

‘It is and it is 5.56 in the morning.’

‘I’m calling about your recent complaint.’ (Facebook fans of mine will know about my lost luggage and my 5 hour delays, but are probably quite rightly thinking hang on, that was ages ago, surely a reputable company like Lufthansa would have sorted that out by now ).

‘It’s 5.56 in the morning.’ I repeated.

‘Is it not a good time?’

5 weeks ago might have been a good time, while my luggage was lost might have been a good time but before 6 am on a Tuesday certainly wasn’t a good time and I told her so in no uncertain terms ,demanding she ring back on Friday morning.

Of course I couldn’t get back to sleep and even if I had there was just 22 minutes until my alarm, so instead of blissful sleep I lay awake wondering if I lost my only chance to sort out my beef with Lufthansa once and for all.