Getting Lost Coming Home from Malls

On Wednesday, I traveled to the Shopping Centers on Orchard Road.  I took the bus Rich and I had taken to go to the Botanic Garden.  I actually got off the bus a stop later than I would have liked, but it worked out well, because I went into stores that I had only seen from a distance up to that point.  I found "Ollie's Meatballs" for lunch, as well as a Watson's Drug Store, and the infamous Daiso $2 store.   The $2 store was packed, and I couldn't find some of the things I wanted, so I kept wandering around the store, trying to locate the items I desired, and waiting for the lines to get smaller.  When the lines were finally reasonable, I gave up the search, and headed home.

When I left the building, I realized that I didn't know where to catch the bus to get home.  I know that seems stupid, and, believe me, I am still mad at myself for not discovering this earlier!  Imagine that you took a bus to Water Tower Place.  Now imagine that Michigan Avenue became a one-way street just as you crossed Chicago Avenue.  To go in the opposite direction, you would need to get to Lake Shore Drive.  And to make it harder, the only way to get to LSD is via underground walkways without street names, just showing building names.  To make matters worse, I must have been feeling pretty cocky that day, because I hadn't brought a map with me!  At one point, I saw a bus stop on the other side of the road.  I thought there was a possibility that it could have buses that could take me home.  However, I had been wandering outside for 15 minutes or so.  I was, literally, a "hot mess"!  The only stores in view to take me back into the mall were Hermes and Prada.  On my best days, those stores intimidate me.  There was no way I was going there at that time.  So, I wandered for 45 minutes to an hour.  I finally stopped at the concierge desk in the mall.  He told me to take a different bus # home.  When I asked him how to get to that bus stop, he gave me some vague answer.  I ended up backtracking, and taking the subway.  I had been so delighted when I found out that the bus would take me right from our apartment complex to the mall, but if I had just taken the subway on the way home, I could have walked back and forth to the subway station 3-4 times for all the wandering I did trying to find the right bus stop!!!

On Friday, I headed to another mall closer to our apartment.  I found the correct buses and arrived quickly.  There was a CD store at that mall, and I had seen some CD's that had been reviewed in the Singapore paper.  Unfortunately, they didn't have either of the CD's that I wanted.  But the trip was not for naught, as there is a larger version of our local grocery store in that mall.  They had Guinness on sale for 3 cans for $12, and it turned out to be the kind of Guinness that Rich likes.  They also have a larger selections of wines in that store.  So I bought all of the things I needed, and loaded up my little wheelie shopping shopping cart.  I headed back out to the bus stop, only to realize that I was on a one-way street AGAIN, and couldn't backtrack to get home!  I figured out how to get back home, but missed my stop, and had to transfer twice to get back home.  By the time I returned, I was hot, sweaty, angry with myself, and despondent because I didn't learn my lesson after my fiasco on Wednesday!  Luckily, it was a very pleasant evening, and I grabbed my iPad, and headed to the pool to do some reading and get into a better mood.