Categories
General

Blackout!

My washing machine is playing up again. Last time it turned out to be a kid’s sock stuck in the pump. I suspect the same this time around. Damn. I managed to get a load of laundry done in it last night anyway, but… well, more of that later.

Last night a storm-and-a-half raged across the city. It hit my neck of the woods around 10pm. Although there was barely any rain, the wind more than made up for it. I swear at one point I was thinking of Dorothy’s house blowing away in the Wizard of Oz at one point.

A bit after 11pm, I was just about to go to bed, when I thought hey… the computers are still on. I’ll go turn them off in case there’s a blackout, so they shut down gracefully. So, stroll over to computers. Start shutting down… Ka-chunk, they start doing it…

Click. Blackness. No power. Blackout. D’oh! I scrambled for a torch. Wait! Power again! Literally only for a second though, then it was gone again. I turned everything off at the mains, then retired to bed. The power was back in the morning thankfully.

This morning I was looking for my monthly train ticket. I bought it yesterday. I couldn’t find it. Then it dawned on me. Probably still in my shirt pocket. My shirt pocket which is attached to my shirt. Which having worn yesterday, I put in the wash last night. That’s right, a brand spanking new $83 train ticket, washed away.

Damn. So I’ve got hold of a form for getting a refund on the ticket. Commonsense says it should be too hard, since I bought it with a card, and therefore have proof of payment. However, commonsense may not come into play here, as the ticketing company have a reputation which leads me to believe it may be easier to get blood from a stone.

The form doesn’t have a category for "lost ticket". They do have one for "mutilated ticket", but incredibly it requires that the ticket be presented and readable (either by sight or electronically). Hell, how likely is it to be readable if it’s been mutilated?! They also have a category for "special consideration" which presumably covers everything else. But I’ll see what little bits of the ticket I can recover to put in with my claim. Nothing readable, I’m betting.

Oh well, worth a try.

By Daniel Bowen

Transport blogger / campaigner and spokesperson for the Public Transport Users Association / professional geek.
Bunurong land, Melbourne, Australia.
Opinions on this blog are all mine.