Wiener Wednesday

Have you ever had one of those days where if you could do it all over again, you wouldn’t?  This week’s edition of Wiener Wednesday will be spent talking about my Wiener Tuesday. 

Yesterday started like any other.  I was looking forward to making a trip to town because the girls from my childbirth class were having a reunion to show off the new babies.  One of the girls, Sofia, was hosting it at her apartment.  I arrived at Sofia’s apartment, and it turned out that everyone cancelled but me!  That was ok…we had a good time anyway!  She has an adorable little boy named Ari.  Can you tell his mother is Greek?  

 

I love it how him and Eli are completely unimpressed with one another.  This was the first time he has been around another baby that is the same age as him (Ari is two weeks older), and I was curious what he would do…apparently nothing.  :o)  They both like sticking out their tongues though!

   

So, I hung out for a couple of hours, and then I headed back a couple of blocks to the garage where I was parked.  This is where the story goes downhill (literally). On the way to the garage, I had to pass by a bar where several men where standing outside.  This didn’t really faze me because this is not uncommon in Vienna, and there is usually never any threat.  However, these men began catcalling, whistling, clapping, and yelling at me.  Also, not uncommon, and I usually just ignore them and walk faster.  These guys were a bit more determined than I’ve ever encountered before though.  They began following me at a brisk pace while making lewd gestures.  Now this is the point of the story where I started getting nervous.  I was not worried for myself, but I didn’t know the best way to protect Eli!  So, I basically started running from them to which they responded by running as well. 

Now, I discovered that a LOT goes through your mind when you are terrified.  My first thought was how in the world do I get out of the garage ridiculously fast?  Here in Vienna, they do not have garage attendants that sit in a booth to collect your money as you exit.  You stick your ticket in a machine located somewhere in the garage (usually at the stairwells) to pay BEFORE you get in your car, and you put the paid-for ticket in another machine that lets you exit.  It can be quite embarrassing for a first-timer in a garage of this fashion when you pull up to the exit with an unpaid ticket, and people are lined up behind you.  Just imagine having to get everyone to reverse!  Anyway…back on topic…

The second thought was forget the ticket, I’ll just get us locked up in the car and drive around in the garage till police come.  The third thought was how do I get Eli out of the stroller and into a car seat?  I decided that I would simply grab him out of the stroller, leave the stroller in the garage, forget the car seat, and Britney Spears him out of there.  The final thought?  Well, what if they stayed around in the garage?  Would I be prepared to run them over?  Abso-stinkin’-lutely.  I honestly think I would have done anything at that point to protect my baby.  Alright, here we go….

Instead of going to the pedestrian entrance where I would've had to tackle stairs or wait for an elevator, I decided to just run down the steep hill where the cars enter.  In hindsight, it was not the best idea.  See, I’m a bit of a klutz.  I promptly tripped, lost my shoe, and oh yes, broke my toe.  *sigh*

Did I mention Eli is hysterically crying out of exhaustion at this point?  Naptime couldn’t have come at a worse moment…

I’m at my car, and I realize the men must have decided they had terrorized me enough for the day.  I’m still not comfortable with lingering, so I quickly get Eli into his car seat and lock the doors.  Now I can leave, right?  Wrong.  Remember thought number one?  Well, I had forgotten to pay for my ticket.  STINKS!  I look around, and I don’t see a machine anywhere.  I don’t even see a sign that points to where it is.  Since it is a grocery store garage, I thought it might actually be in the store.  So, I go over and stick a coin in a shopping cart to rent one (yeah, they do that here too), and I sit the car seat in it to head up to the store. 

As Eli’s crying wafted through the store, I realize there is no machine.  Where in the dickens is this thing?!  I decided it was time to call in the troops…I call Jeremy.  I left out all the small talk (and story leading up to this), and I read him the garage sign about parking tickets.  He said even though he’d never seen a garage like that, he thought I had to go through the cash register in the grocery store to pay for my ticket.  DOUBLE STINKS! 

I go and wait in line and promptly grab some chocolate to attempt to snuff out the memory of being chased through the street.  When I get up to the register, I hand the cashier the ticket.  She speaks of lot of German to me, and hands me a receipt.  I point to my ticket that she had validated but didn’t give back to me, and she speaks more German.  I tell her that I don’t understand, and she points to the garage and shoves my Snickers bar in my face.  Okaaaaay, so this is where I start crying.  I walk back to the elevator, and I call Jeremy again.  I tell him she wouldn’t give me the ticket back even though I paid, and now I don’t know what to do.  At this point the cashier leaves the store and walks down the street.  So, now I’m thinking, “great, she just left for lunch!”  A few minutes later, she comes back and starts yelling at me.  I cry more, and Jeremy tells me to give the phone to her.  He converses with her, and he tells me that she has to manually unlock the gate in the garage, and that’s where she went.  But of course, I stood there blubbering like an idiot.  So, he told me that she was going back, and I needed to get to my car as quickly as possible because she was pretty ticked off.

I got to the car in record time…crying, shaking, and traumatized…but would you like to guess the next part?  Someone parked so close to me, I couldn’t get into the car from the driver’s side.  I had to climb in through the passenger side door.  And as I peeled out of my spot (being very careful not to hit the car next to me), what did I forget about?  The garage foundation pole on the passenger side of the car in my blind spot.  Yep, I put a nice, big dent in our new (to us) Ebay car. 

The cashier waved to me as I exited, and Eli fell asleep peacefully as I drove home.  A Snickers bar never tasted better.  :o)