Chaos reigns

Is it possible to be pathologically disorganised? Can I blame some kind of path, rather than my own failings as an individual?

I should be at housegroup tonight. Our housegroup is organising a conference, elsewhere in the country, on Work and Faith. I missed out the early planning stages of this, due to Mog's op and other problems at the start of this academic year. I'm not attending the conference itself (childcare stuff plus general fear), but should be helping out with the planning. It doesn't help that I have no real idea what we're talking about, what I should be doing, what shape this should take. Give me a group of girls and I'll get them playing silly games. Give me a hypothetical room full of businessmen and clergy, and ask me to find something about Work and Faith, and I'm running scared. Grown ups. Eek. Can't I do something unobtrusive like go and change nappies or bake biscuits? Thought I might have been on a winner with the biscuits, but sadly the conference centre is catered.

So instead I've been given a small pile of information to sift through, to look at things which should go on the promotional material. I've had it a long time. I don't know what to do with it. I am an intelligent woman, but give me this paperwork and the meaning slides through my fingertips as I read it.

Be that as it may, I managed to scribble a couple of things together ready for the meeting tonight. I also had some articles to print out to take with me. Already running late, I hit the printer button and managed to print about half of them before the ink ran out. Grabbing a pen I wrote down the URL before grabbing my coat and heading out of the door. Returning seconds later to turn the house upside down in search of my keys. Mog, still awake, laughing at me. Sitter picking up on the fraughtness of it all and sifting through the many items on the bathroom windowsill.

Eventually discovering the keys under the kettle (why? why under it? and how?), I headed out, a mere 30 minutes late. Arrived at the house to find all the curtains open, all the lights on, and a suspicious lack of extra cars around. Knocked at the door and was answered by the son of the household. Extremely polite, but no, his parents weren't hosting housegroup that night, and no, he didn't know where they were instead. Marvellous. I have no idea where they are meeting, and by the time I return home to check emails and find out, I will be over an hour late, which for a two hour meeting is just silly.

So, I head to Tesco's instead. Except I don't; I find myself heading towards the other end of town, carried away on the one way system I had inadvertently entered at the wrong junction. Thank goodness for roundabouts. Back on track, I walk through a deserted Tescos. Empty aisles, empty shelves, vast crates of crushed cardboard boxes where customer services are usually to be found. And no Ecover washing up liquid.

It's not been a great day; Little Fish's power chair got trapped in the sunroom, and has ripped holes in my new lino. I was told Bob would be coming and he hasn't. And I have a difficult situation with a neighbour; something I've been expecting for a while, but which is now going to cause some complications. I feel at least five paces behind everything I am supposed to be doing. Not fantastic.

Tia