This Week's Adventures

Most exciting moment?  Being completely lost in Sydney.  So lost, in fact, that I momentarily considered parking the car and taking the train home so that Larry could go back and get the car.  But then I dug deep and reminded myself that I am a 45-year old, college-educated, 21st century woman.  We began ignoring the GPS (which is what caused the lost-ness) and intuitively back-tracked over the bridge.  We simply went home.

I was supposed to be driving Nicole to her Classics Dinner at a boys' school in Summer Hill, an inner-west suburb of Sydney.  According to the GPS and Bing Maps, this drive should take 28 minutes (it's only 12-14 miles away).  With a targeted arrival time of 6:45, we left the house at 5:45 to allow for traffic and getting lost.  Instantly, the GPS changed our route because of a "traffic incident" on our path.  It proceeded to change our route every 2 minutes and eventually had me doing u-turn after u-turn until we ended up in a cul-de-sac somewhere in either Willoughby or Artarmon.

At 6:30, we finally crossed the Sydney Harbor Bridge at approximately 10 miles per hour.  To avoid yet another "traffic incident," the GPS directed me to take the East Suburb exit and then instructed me on how to drive through Sydney to get to the West.  Then, the GPS got really confused.

Once we were buried between the skyscrapers, the GPS signal intermittently failed.  First, it said we were on Elizabeth Street.  Then, we were on Market Street.  First, I was supposed turn left.  I dutifully put my signal on and get on the left-turn only lane.  Stopped at the light, the GPS changed its mind and told me to drive 60 meters and turn right.  Only the presence of my daughter and my conscience prevented me from swearing like a sailor.

It was now 6:50.  Nicole was going to miss the social time and would probably be 30 minutes late for the sit-down dinner.  We conferred, and she agreed that the Classics Dinner wasn't mandatory and she'd be okay with missing it.  At that point, all I wanted to do was go home.  We did.

Ignoring the GPS completely, we turned left and left again to retrace our steps and, hopefully, find the Bridge.  In a city where the Bridge is the dominant landmark, it was thankfully fairly easy to get back on the right path to home.  We went back over the harbor and found the Pacific Highway.  Continuing to ignore the GPS' instructions to turn on various side streets, I stuck to Pacific Highway like a white on rice through North Sydney, Milson's Point, Waverton, Artarmon, Chatswood, and ultimately, blessed Roseville.

One hour and 20 minutes after backing out of the garage, we three pulled back into it (we picked Larry up as he walked home from the train station).

I have a very understanding daughter with a tremendous sense of humor.  She and I cooked dinner together, and we all sat down for American Idol.  Not the dinner we were all expecting, but Classic in its own way.