It’s been 38 days, 20,000 miles and Tom is about to die. Because I’m going to kill him.
Though we have been ‘together’ a very long time, we’ve never spent this much time together. And I do mean together, as in we haven’t even been in different buildings, and are usually no more than 20 feet apart. For 6 weeks. Let me say that again: 6 weeks.
Those of you who know me well, know that I have a pretty serious introvert side that needs attention now and then. And by attention, that means being left completely alone for a while. So, when I have to spend too much time with someone, I start noticing every little quirk and they start to make me a bit crazy. Did I mention that I’ve been with Tom non-stop for 6 weeks?
I finally snapped in Barcelona. It was the weird eating schedule he has. Or rather lack of schedule. But I won’t go into that, let’s just say that I was ticked off all afternoon at him; and the one thing that will make Tom mad at me, is me being mad at him. It’s a vicious cycle. In any case, Parc Guell was not nearly as charming as it was suppose to be as a result of us sniping at each other.
And then, there was the rental car debacle that fixed everything.
Here was the plan: we get packed up and Tom walks the few blocks to the Europcar rental agency to pick up the car. There is no parking available in front of the hostel, so he was suppose to drive by, wave at me and then I would gather up the rest of the bags and head to the corner. He would circle the block, we’d throw the bags in and be on our way to Salobrena. How hard could it be?
Hah! I can hear anyone who’s been to Barcelona laughing out loud at this plan.
First part goes great. He drives by, I get the bags and make it to the corner in less than 2 minutes to wait for him to come back. And wait. And wait.
After 10 minutes I start wondering if maybe I was mistaken and that wasn’t him that drove past. But it had to be, I saw him. After 15 minutes, I come to the conclusion that he’s just gotten turned around and would be there any minute.
An hour goes by and now I’m just getting worried. How the hell long could it take to go around the block!
I haul all the bags back to the entrance of the hostel and convince the maintenance man to look after them for 2 minutes while I check to see if the clerk has any messages for me.
He’s been gone 1 ½ hours at this point. If he was in an accident, he’d have no way of telling anyone where to find me, and I don’t speak enough Spanish to start checking hospitals.
No message at the desk, but then it occurs to me that he might have his phone turned on, and I have the laptop. I frantically send an email: “Are you OK? I’m starting to get really worried. I’m waiting in the downstairs lobby.”
Reply: “Ok just lost”
Me, relieved: “Stop somewhere and tell me were you are. I’ll take a cab to you.”
Tom: “No place to stop”
As it turns out, they really like one way streets in Barcelona. And, there is no rhyme or reason to the way the city is laid out. And, there really isn’t any place you can even stop long enough to get directions without blocking a lot of traffic.
Which is what Tom did—and after 2 hours I hear him shout from the front door for me. I grabbed all of the bags again and we got them in the car. But not before we got a ticket for stopping in a taxi zone—which is what we were trying to avoid with the circling the block plan.
I’m not entirely convinced that he didn’t do this intentionally to make me appreciate him after yesterday—but he swears not. And we have 2 more weeks.
Now that's funny, I don't care who you are!
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