Thursday, May 5, 2011

The beginning of my day

Here's the situation:


My 8-5 gig occasionally requires me to attend board meetings. Such was the case today. As my boss and I pulled up to the venue, my boss began checking his email so I told him to keep at it and I'd go find out which room we were in then come back for him. Since this was our first meeting at a new location, my convention and education directors (Kim and Pam) asked me to evaluate the place and determine if it would be a viable option for some upcoming classes we were scheduling. 


In other words, be nosy ... sure, I can do that. 


So when I saw two signs, one with our company name pointing down toward the basement and the other sign pointing up toward the restaurant, I naturally went to the restaurant. Keep in mind that I was instructed to be nosy, after all, so I needed to size up the restaurant. 


When I entered the restaurant the first thing I saw were bathrooms - a very welcome sign after a venti latte, 32 ounces of water and a two-hour drive through Portland traffic. Besides, Kim and Pam would probably want me to check out the bathrooms as well. 


The bathrooms checked out fine, so I investigated the rest of the restaurant. It was clean enough but strangely vacant. I roamed around long enough to deem it acceptably clean and quaint, then went for the door. 


The door wouldn't open. I shook it, beat on it, and may have kicked it, but the stupid thing wouldn't budge. After another quick sweep of the restaurant, I confirmed that I was alone and dialed the office for help. The conversation went something like this:


Kim - "Hello?"
Me - "So ... funny story. We're here and well, I had to go to the bathroom. But only now I can't ... uh ... get out.
Kim - *SILENCE*
Me - "Like I'm locked in. I can't ... get out."
Kim - What? *hysterical laughter*
Me - *clears throat*
Kim - *more hysterical laughter*
Me - *crickets*
Kim - "You're serious?"
Me - "You guys told me to check it out! So I went upstairs instead of downstairs so I could check out restaurant and the door wasn't locked when I came in. But now it's locked." 
Kim - *chuckling under her breath* 
Me - "Kim! There is no one in here and I can't get out. I have to get downstairs for the board meeting."
Kim - "I'll call my contact and call you back." 


It took another ten minutes for Kim to convince her contact that despite the fact that the restaurant was closed, I was, indeed, locked inside. But the highlight of the adventure came when I strolled up to my boss' car (approximately 20 minutes after I left him to go "find the meeting room"). He rolled down the window and asked, "What happened, you get lost?" 


Me - "No. Actually I was locked in."


And that was the beginning of my day.

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