This is why....

[saffiter]

... I am paranoid about my keys.

I got home from work and decided to run across the road to the shops to get some stuff to drink and some things for dinner. No problems there. Dumped my stuff, went out, locked my front door, went down the stairs, out the 'locks itself as it closes and you need a key for' front door to my building, across the road and to the shops.

Again, no problems there.

Bought my stuff, no problems. Walked back across the road reached into my handbag to get my keys....

Oh...

shit.

No keys. No keys in the normal pocket. No keys in the other pocket, tore my bag apart, no keys.

*whimpers*

I need those keys to get in the buildings' front door. I remembered locking my apartment door, but the keys in the bag... not so much of the remembering happening at this time. My only theory:

I'd left the damn things hanging in my apartment door lock for all the building to see. Only thing going through my brain is : "Don't panic! Don't panic! You can't get into your building, it's cold, you're hungry, you've got stuff that needs to go into the fridge, and you can't speak a word of Polish but DON'T PANIC!!!"

So, I look up to see if there are any lights on in the building. Thankfully the apartment above me was still lit. Took me about a minute to work out what number it was (20) and I pressed their intercom/buzzer thing.

Now, remember, I don't speak any Polish. They, I'm pretty sure, don't speak any English, and I'm pressing the intercom buzzer to talk to them... yeah... this isn't going to end well at all is what the little voice in the back of my head is thinking.

They answer, and I start babbling at them with this panicked sounding voice in English. Amazingly they must've got the gist that something had happend 'cause they pressed the door unlock button... o.O (which didn't work and they understood enough of my "It's not OPENING!!!" thing to hit the button again). Queue me yelling "THANK YOU!!!!" (in Polish) to them as I go flying up the stairs hitting the lights on my way thorugh.

Guess where my keys were.

Yup, you guessed it. Hanging in the lock for the whole world to see *shakes head*.

I'm glad they opened the door for me 'cause I had two other options: 

1) sit miserably on the doorstop until someone goes in or out... I could've been waiting all night for that one.
2) randomly start pressing buzzers and annoy people enough that they either open the door, or come down to yell at me (hence opening the door and letting poor sodden Aussie girl in).

Comments

[boz4pm.livejournal.com]

O_O SO glad you managed to get into your building AND that your keys were safe and sound. *hugs*

[masi-tfoot.livejournal.com]

*grins* I'm rather glad as well *returns hug*.

I've done this before when I was living in China. Then, though, it was leaving my keys in teh flat and going out. Thankfully then I was living with another girl, so all I had to do was hang around until they turned back up (or ring them on my mobile and wait for them to turn up with their keys).

When I'm living in Australia I'm not so paranoid about my keys, I live with my parents. It's just when I'm living in a foreign country where I can't speak the language I get really paranoid about my keys. Tonight marks the first night I actually went out the buildings' front door without checking my front pocket (I usually stick my foot in the door and double check my handbag pocket before I head off).

What I was most worried about was my pay was sitting on the coffee table in full view (we get paid cash in hand here. I hadn't hidden it in my proverbial sock draw yet). Plus I've got a laptop and DS Lite sitting in full view as well (and my dvd's and video games). I was more worried about that than not being able to get into the building.

But, yeah. I have interesting adventures *grins* (I can laugh about it now, I'm back inside, dry, fed and in central heating).