The Call

We spent June waiting for a phone call which never came. On the July long weekend we had some wonderful people over for Canada day celebrations and exciting discussions of the "what if?" nature regarding the future. So I continue plugging away at work without any interest or passion anymore. I finally received the call around July 10 to go to Winnipeg on the 13th for 24 hours. It was a very bad trip. My flight out of London to Pearson went well and arrived on time with no real problems, I only took one bag a carry on to eliminate problems with luggage. I was supposed to have a 1.5 hour layover at pearson and we got on the plane on time. The plane then sat on the tarmac for the next hour till weather cleared over Winnipeg. I was supposed to arrive @ 9:45 pm I arrived sometime after 11:00 where my limo was supposed to be waiting to take me to my hotel. There was no Limo. I had no hotel info and $20 in my wallet with my debt card at home. All I kept thinking is this is some sort of test. I started talking to locals to find out which hotels would be located walking distance to Northwest's home office (on the phone I was told the hotel was 5 minutes away). No one knew of downtown hotels or the location of the North West company. So I picked up a phone book and started calling to see if anyone had a reservation under my name. I found a hotel called the Fort Garry that had my reservations. Next I started calling Limo companies to find out who was supposed to pick me up, this search failed. I hailed a cab, clenched $20 tightly in my hand and propared to leap from the cab the moment I hit $20 on the meter. I made it to the hotel OK, I don't know what route or how long it took but I can assure you it cost $16.90 to get from the airport to the fort Garry at 1:00 in the morning. I had been told that all my expenses at the hotel were covered so that wouldn't be a problem, until I actually got there. They did have the room paid for but that was it, it had been 18 hours since I ate and I was getting room service one way or another. At this point my patience was wearing thin. I told them I'd settle up in th morning and to send me a big steak and a couple of cokes. I was exhausted, annoyed, disoriented and ready to punch kittens. The hotel was a very nice traditional hotel in the style of the Royal York. I ate spent 20 minutes triing to set the alarm clock and went to bed at 2:00 dreading my 7:30 meeting.
I awoke at 4:00 with no chance of getting back to sleep and thought I should probably focus on a attitude change before I walked in there though at this point I would have happily hopped back on the plane and gone home calling the whole thing a wash.