I did not wake in a grump this morning so am unsure why i now find myself in a depressive heap, back in bed at one pm.
Yesterday poured with rain all day and i was perfectly content, writing, planning, duolingo spanish and i had an early night with no alcohol. This morning dawned sunny with a crispness in the air and I enjoyed eating my omelette outside after yesterday's thunderstorms.
I guess im struggling with interactions and do find that so very depressing. But mainly perhaps, im just not having enough interactions. Without eating out i find little opportunity to engage in conversation with people which is unusual for me.
I went for my 'Drop In Clip' haircut at 9.30 which lasted all of fifteen minutes, a dry cut or rather just a clip. Hey ho, twenty pounds, thought id save myself a job once home but looks as though crop shop will still be on my agenda. The girl was nice enough but we had little language, she appeared to understand what i was gesturing and saying, says she can understand but not speak english and i didnt know where to begin to say but i want you to actually cut it, i tried asking about washing but she said she didnt do that but i could see a chair and basin through the back. An iraqi kurd who has lived in denmark seven years but wants to go home. I just smiled and said thank you very much and looked pleased with my clip, somebody else was waiting and i felt rushed out.
From there i go to the ever helpful tourist office, of the three assistants it is the smiling man who greets me. I explain im here for five days and would like some ideas, am interested in nature, art and bike rides. I should go on the ferry to the islands he says and gives me one map in english, two in danish/german. It appears that he thinks our interactions are over as he turns away. Do you have any off road routes i ask, my host said there are many trails similar to one i have found. No, he says, just road. I think perhaps he has not understood so i talk about the round the lake loop with its extensions. Yes, he says, that is one route but there are no more. He wants to get back to his work.
I ask for help with trains, explain my difficulty finding prices for travel and need to know how best to plan it. Three individual tickets or one straight through. No he cannot help me with that. I must take a fifty minute bus ride and go to Odense for that information. No he cannot give me a phone number to call, if the websites are down i must just keep on trying. The barriers are down and i will clearly get no more help. I thank him sweetly and leave.
My next task is to buy coffee, bread, milk and some tortellini which is on special offer at Lidl. I abandon my attempt at coffee given their selection and am confused by the price of the tortellini. I ask for a price check on the tortellini at checkout and the girl confirms the shelf price, i show her the torn advert from the leaflet i picked up yesterday. No she says that is not correct. I ask her to find a leaflet and look. She does so, tutting. People in the queue behind me are tutting too. She finds the advert, checks again but the till still shows a higher price and then when she searches, she finds the small print that says tuesday to thursday only.
Today is Monday. I am here until Friday. As yet, I have no onward accomodation booked. Having half made the decision to go to Malmo, a decision to go further in Sweden and see my friend Rebecka in Gothenburg has arisen and is not too big a leap. I have been trying to find train prices but the site refuses to calculate a price all the way through. I have emailed asking for advice but as yet have no reply. I cannot find a phone number to call.
If i abandon any exploration of Copenhagen and go to Gothenburg instead i may as well abandon my flight and fly directly home from Gothenburg as train to Malmo and then Copenhagen appears to cost more than the cost of a flight home.
So, frustration is the root cause of my malaise. Travelling is such hard work sometimes. I drib and drab around playing spider solitaire and doing on line jigsaws until around four pm when i discover my malaise has left me and i am now out sitting by the lake writing in warm autumn sunshsine.
I do so hate the complexity of decision making and not being able to find the information i need exacerbates the issues. Sometimes i think im a rubbish traveller. I think that to be really comfortable you probably need to be able to sit and linger over drinking tea and eating cakes but ive never really been able to do that. I might manage a morning coffee a couple of times a month at home, but thats it and here i dont even do that. Accomodation costs are too high.
I need to change something if i am to survive this week. Pubs are the only places where i generally feel comfortable but the complications of alcohol are too great to frequent them often. I sat happily by myself, writing on Saturday night, contentedly minding my own business until some locals couldnt resist trying to find out what i was doing there and although at the time it seemed like a good plan to join them at the bar, it ended up being rather a late and expensive night!
Although i cannot tell you what time i came home, i think it was before midnight and suffice it to say i arrrived home safely with my ipad. No doubt the security element of drinking with an ipad would soon wear off and im unsure it's a risk i really want to repeat. I managed to leave my hat there and had to retrieve it yesterday!
Trying to think what take to Cornwall with me it is diffiuclt. I need to make bike and swimming decisions. I need to take two bikes, day to day convenience as well as my mountain bike, camelbak, bike shoes, clothes, pump etc etc etc and hope i find others and terrain to ride. Swim wise, i dont really want to take my wet suit but if i am to fit in with swim plans i see of others on facebook then i think i need it to go with me and my dryrobe and goggles and tow float and and and...... I soon start filling up my car with 'stuff'. Therell be no room for a loom, yarn and fabrics but without craft i may struggle making connections?
Ok so its now 8.50pm... Nope its now 9.20 ive done nothing this evening about where im going on friday but have made significant inroads into Cornwall, bridge, wild swimming, folk music, meetup groups, weavers guild so hope to be able to make connections with people once there and my nightly hand washing is dripping around the bathroom. Tomorrow will be another put on wet crops day, for they never manage to dry out overnight.
