Did I tell you the youngest and I are going to see Coldplay in Perth? It’s a post-HSC mother-daughter treat.
Both of us went online when ticket sales opened to increase our chances of success. The frenzy asaw hundreds of thousands of people join the virtual queue.
I got to the front of the queue first, reserved the tickets, added my credit card details, pressed pay and stared in mounting panic at the wheel turning endlessly on screen before a message popped up apologising and saying it wasn’t me, it was them and I’d need to join the queue again.
Noooooooo!!!
By that stage there were 100,000 people in the virtual queue trying to buy tickets.
Fortunately the youngest was still in with a chance. She got to the top of the queue and there were only hotel and ticket packages available at vast expense. I’d gone into crazed “get them at any cost” mode by that point, so we threw away her inheritance in exchange for two general admission tickets and a room for the night.
Then the youngest was sent to the deputy principal’s office for using her phone during maths class.
While she was talking her way out of detention I got to work securing frequent flyer flights.
At that point we were making it short and sweet – a three-night getaway.
But last week I had a change of heart when I saw there was a Qantas sale on – I decided to tick off a bucket list side trip to Ningaloo.
I am desperate to snorkel on the reef and see its beauty as I’m fearful that climate change will destroy it.
So I booked our airfares and two nights accommodation at Exmouth, then I booked a later flight home from Perth to Sydney.
My final task was to cancel the original flight home. My Qantas account showed the flight from Sydney to Perth with a “manage booking” hyperlink beside it, below it was the Perth to Sydney leg, which had a separate “manage booking” hyperlink beside it.
I clicked on the Perth to Sydney leg and cancelled it, then realised in horror that it had cancelled the entire booking, including the Sydney to Perth flight.
What?? Noooooo!!!!!!
Cue a puddle of panic and tears on Saturday. I called DD and begged me to help me, as he has major frequent flyer privileges due to flying all over the world for work.
He got onto someone on the help desk who confirmed my tickets were cancelled and couldn’t be uncancelled. And there were no other frequent flyer flights available that day.
What??? Nooooo!!!!
She said there were no flight the day before either, but she might be able to get me flights the day after, which was no use at all as I was flying in on the same day as the concert.
Then DD asked if he could specially request the flights and she went off to check and came back and said YES!!!!!!!
Thank heavens for that.
My learning from this story is that you can’t cancel one leg of a return flight despite there being deceptive separate hyperlinks for each leg. You need to talk to the Qantas helpdesk.
I feel like writing to Allan Joyce and suggesting this is made a little clearer on the website. Those separate hyperlinks are deceiving.
Then yesterday I finally decided, after five years of dragging my feet, to do that awkward bowel cancer screening test thingy.
I have quite a few thoughts about the fine print in that process as well.
For example, no one told me you have to provide TWO samples from two separate occasions.
I also kept in mind the advice I got from a friend whose sample was rejected because it was too big – she advised me to “poke don’t scoop” …
Then I packaged everything up and checked the instructions for sending them off, which started with the words “complete the participant details form”.
Huh? I checked the envelope, but there was no participant details form to be found.
So I went online and discovered I’d have to print one off.
I haven’t had a working printer for a very long time. I dug it out of the cupboard and remembered it needed new ink.
Bugger!
So I went to the supermarket and paid $32 for a cartridge. I got back home and discovered I’d bought an S40 cartridge instead of an S45. Fark! So I trudged back in the rain and paid $39 for an S45 cartridge.
So much for it being a free bowel cancer screening test.
Then I got back home and couldn’t remember where the printer paper was. Cue major tantrum.
The printer reluctantly spat out the paperwork, I filled it in, but it was arduous and very confusing, with lots of capital “ONLY” threats. And it asked for the special number on the pack I’d been sent. I didn’t have a special number because I’d picked up a spare kit from a random medical centre.
It was also tricky because they wanted to know my GPs details. I don’t currently have one – he ran away to live in France and didn’t tell me.
I also had to go online to Medicare and update my address.
I was pretty over it all by this stage, but I had a few minutes left before 5pm to dash to the post office … which had moved (and a sign on the door informed me it only opens until 3pm anyway). The post box outside the abandoned post office said it was emptied at 4pm every day. The post box down the road had a sign on it saying it was emptied at 12pm every day.
The instructions in the Bowel Cancer Screening Kit said the sample should be posted in the afternoon before postal pick-up time to ensure it wasn’t left at room temperature for too long. So I trudged back home in the rain and returned the sample to the fridge.
It’s now a problem for today.
And I have a sinking feeling they’ll make me do it all over again because I did something incorrectly.
But I’m going to Ningaloo, so HURRAH!
Can’t wait, can’t wait, can’t wait!’
Song of the day: The Marvelette’s “Mr Postman”
housegoeshome 
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