On being prepared

So, my kite may or may not fly (I still don't know), but it is definitely difficult to break into my apartment.

See, I got home from work raring to finish assembling and begin flying the box kite I started yesterday. Within ten or fifteen minutes (post-snack, of course), John was helping me add waxed paper to the dowel-and-twine armature. We used paper and tape rather than nylon or muslin or some other thin fabric, which may not have led to the most durable kite ever, but probably a reasonably effective one.

(It's worth noting that this is a major advantage of having given notice at my job: for the school year up 'til now, I've been getting home miserable and doing nothing but watching the entire series run of "The Hills" online. Seriously. It's the point where I have strong, strong opinions on Justin Bobby and Audrina's relationship. (Justin Bobby, the "we were never really together" line is beyond lame. I saw you two in Cabo! I saw all the Tammy Faye mascara tears!))

We never made it to the park -- immediately upon walking out the door (which locked behind us, of course) we each realized we'd left our keys inside. Oops.

This was followed by a panicky trip up to the roof (for both of us), down the fire escape to our window (for John), and back up again (John, still) with the news that it's really, really hard to get into our locked, fire-escape window. Ultimately, of course, this is good news, but for this particularly moment it was non-ideal.

Long story short, we made a bunch of phone calls to the super (to no avail), and decided it was time to call the locksmith. And so, instead of spending the evening flying the kite in the park, we spent the evening sitting on the porch waiting for the locksmith to arrive. This was roughly an hour or more, for what it's worth.

By the time things were resolved, we'd learned three things. 1) Our door is really, really hard to break into. So hard, in fact, that the locksmith had to drill out the lock, then replace it with a new one. 2) Calling a locksmith (or this locksmith in particular) would be a great way to break into an apartment, if necessary, because he asked for no ID whatsoever and accepted payment in cash. 3) I will never lock myself out again, because doing so is crazy expensive.

By the time things were resolved, it was also totally dark out. This was an evening-long pursuit. Seriously, dudes, streetlights were on and everything.

First, of course, this means no luck with flying the kite tonight, and I don't know if I'll be able to 'til Sunday, which is kind of a bummer. But second, there's a reason I've gone into all this.

I've kind of failed, a little, at the Boy Scout business tonight. Because, ultimately, I was not (even a little bit) prepared. This is just as much a living-in-the-world issue as a Handbook issue, yeah, but still. I'm not sure what the solution is. Utility belt? Bandolier? Checklist? Signs all over my house? I'm not sure. But there's got to be something.