Getting lost, leaving your shopping and Tax!

Has anyone ever been so lost that you just sit there, take in your surroundings and begin to adapt your lifestyle to your new home? Well this happened to me in Central Park, New York. Yep only the biggest fucking park on the planet. I was 18 and I had gone to New York with a family friend and her son. We had been walking hours everyday and I'm very flat footed so my feet ache and get blisters very easily. I tell my family friend that I'm going to sit down for 5 minutes (just outside the park entrance on the zoo side) I'm sitting there, I look up... they are gone. Couldn't believe it. I waited and waited, thinking maybe they went to get an ice cream or a hot dog or something but no, nothing. So I thought fuck it, I'm not missing out on Central Park so in I went to the great unknown, passing animals, people, heroin users, drunks, potential dead bodies and eerily long stretches of completely uninhabited areas of woodland... not even the trees made a noise. You know your deep into the park when you can no longer hear New York traffic. I walked for miles without even thinking about how to get back. Until I think I reached the centre of the park which is in all the movies, the big strip of pavement leading for miles with neat grass and towering trees on either side. This is when I knew I was lost and I should probably start looking for ways to make a bed but first, ice cream! There was an ice cream truck so I got myself and Oreo ice cream and sat on a bench by a memorial of some kind. I think I sat there for about 2 hours watching the world go by until I though I'd better find a way to get back as I was seriously hungry and we were going to TGI FRIDAYS at 7pm (honestly if it was not for TGI I would still be in that park now, living off of ice cream) anyone who has been to Central Park will know there are strategically placed maps and people all there to offer help and direction to the lost souls that stumble into the park.... only problem being the maps did not tell you where the fuck you were standing while reading it... so there is no reference point! The lost helpers are just as helpful, although the most overbaringly friendly human beings I have ever met...in my entire life they just did not help. I said to a man "I'm lost mate, I've been lost for the past 3 maybe 4 hours. Could you please show me how to get to the zoo entrance" to which he replied "the zoo is closed".... really? I don't give a shit if it's closed I just told you I'm lost. Tell me how to get out of this place! After saying those words in a much nicer, more grovelling way, as this man was my only hope he said "okay son, you gotta go down the hill this way take a left at the mermaid statue until you reach the stream. Once at the stream cross the bridge and follow the path around, you should then be able to see the zoo. If you get lost read the maps. Okay sir?" I thanked him and thought about going into a discussion about how poor the maps were to read but I thought sod it. I thanked him and continued my journey like the little Hobbit I am. Mermaid, check... stream, check.... bridge....bridge?.... please? I could not find that bastard bridge ANYWHERE so after much deliberation I hiked up my jeans, removed my shoes and socks and waded through potentially 50 years worth of homeless piss, fish shit and god knows what else. The looks I got from some of the people around were priceless, not as priceless as the look on one of the mothers faces as she witnessed her son drinking the water, haha enjoy hospital, karma is a bitch, bitch. So slightly soggy, delirious from dehydration and all the while still having the most painful feet in existence I finally see the zoo! After a further 30 minutes limpining around the the enormous zoo I reach the front looking like the end scene of the Breakfast Club with one fist raised in triumph. I see my family friend looking worried sick but I informed I was fine and off to TGI l, best day ever!

I got myself Pokémon Heart Gold while I was in New York an it was so cheap $20 or something like that for a brand new game. I go to buy it happy for a bargain and then, boom $30 (I think, it was considerably more than $20 thats all I know) because Americans don't add the tax to the price they spring it on you when you get to the counter...............................What. The. Fuck? What possible reasoning could you have for doing this other than to give the cashier a good laugh every time someone English walks in to their store? I had spotted it earlier in the day and only took $20 with me, the fucking shame of having to put it back because I didn't have any money, I legit sent my family friend to get it for me as I couldn't ever show my face in there again, ever again. That Gamespot on 5th avenue will never see me again, sad times. Isn't that just the worst thing in the world though, coming to pay and you just have not added up in your head correctly. "That will be £34.60" you explain how you thought it would only be £30 and the cashier does that patronising look while sucking air through their teeth like they just saw someone hurt themselves. You're trying to think of what you don't need that will bring the price down. It's too much pressure, there's a judgemental line forming and that twat on the till is looking at you like this has never happened to them before so you do what any rational human would do. Say fuck it, leave your entire shopping on the till and sprint for the exit. So embarrassed you think you may cry but then you remember there is and Iceland down the road and you can get all the shopping you were going to get for half the price so all good!

Anyway I could have written more but this is the face value, you want more you'll have to pay the tax! (Not really)

Kieren