Unwelcome Guest

It was thoughtless of me. I had given my arrival time of 4pm no thought in the last three weeks since reserving my room. The day of my 'mini Melbourne vacation' had finally arrived to find that 4pm was, in fact, my departure time so I didn't get to the Hotel until 6pm. This goes someway to justify her terseness upon my arrival.

Thoughtless - given no thought.

Yes, I said, I did realise that it was a "small operation" and "sorry" I said that she had "planned to go out" and my late arrival had "ruined all that" and that really, she had had a bad day with her "cleaner calling in sick" and was "expected to be sick all week" really this (me at 6pm) was the "very last thing she needed".

"I really am very sorry," I said "it was very thoughtless of me. I should have caught an earlier train. I'm sorry I inconvenienced you."

"Where did you come from?" she asked.

"Castlemaine." I replied.

"Oh, we shall have a lot to talk about. I visit Castlemaine often. I bet we know some of the same people."

"I actually live closer to Newstead than Castlemaine." I said, just so she knew that we probably didn't know any of the same people because really, I don't know anyone.

"Newstead?" she said "Well, that's hardly Castlemaine." Her tone was reproachful and accusatory as if I really didn't know what I was talking about.

She showed me the breakfast room. She showed me the shared bathroom. She showed me my room.

Her tone remained impatient and irritated. I tried to keep mine pleasant and light but feared I wasn't getting very far with this woman. While I did not recall any mention of accurate check-in times on her website, I did remember a note to let her know if one was going to be home late so she could provide a pass-code for the door.

"I'm going out to dinner tonight," I said "it's my friend's birthday - that's why I've come down to Melbourne, we're going out to dinner to celebrate - I may well be late getting back."

"Well I won't be waiting up for you!" she snapped, "You've already proved yourself unreliable enough when it comes to time-keeping. There is a key in your room - you can let yourself in."

"Goodness," I joked, "I've already got myself quite the reputation, and I've only been here five minutes." but she wasn't having a bar of it. She left me to my room and I closed the door feeling most unwelcome.

After I changed and readied myself for dinner, I locked my room and made my way down the long, narrow hallway towards the front door, keys in hand. She was half way up the stairs and she turned to look down on me - figuratively as well as literally. She looked tired; face and bone.

"I am sorry," I said again, "for being late and for disrupting your plans. I hope you have a nice evening after your difficult day."

She nodded and said "Good night." as she turned and walked up the stairs and out of sight.

Survey

Today I have a couple of questions to ask you about this website. It's been trucking along with its shoes untied and it's hair poorly brushed with the slightly embarrassed knowledge that it was only ever half-arsed but too busy ordering another beer to really hold itself accountable. All change comes from initial insight, and while I've found some of that insight in the depths of my own navel, I would really appreciate some feedback from you.

As I tell people at work "any feedback is good feedback" so my I respectfully request a small amount of your time to leave your feedback in the comments below. I have a couple of questions here that you might like to answer - or you might like to just freestyle it down below (not a euphamism for rounding third base).

1. If thejamjar.com was an animal, what kind of animal would it be and why?
2. What do you like to read or see when you plug thejamjar.com into your browser?
3. You are now the owner of thejamjar.com, what is the first thing you would
   change, fix or do?

Results from Kaput Comments:

Fox:

1. an animal from a Hayao Miyazaki movie, because it is alternatively colourful, serious, elegant and fun

2. I read via g-reader and I like when there are picture stories, like the chopped one

3. two things. firstly, do something with the home page, because there are 8 possible choices (not counting navigation) and other-firstly, make the font size bigger in these wee form boxes

4. a way to subscribe to additional comments on a post?

5. the captcha comes up weird. also you don't notice it's come up.

AnnaPray:

I like your blog and have kept coming back to it year after year because you are one of the most interesting, free-spirited and creative people I have ever encountered. I would not change a thing (except echoing what another writer said, about the font showing up in one form before being replaced by the desired font ... but that's actually kind of cool, a sort of kinetic effect). I like that The Jamjar is multimedia, and that you are so gifted that you can do many of these media yourself. Michelle didn't pay me to write this review.

Barto

1. Your weblog would be an octopus: Very intelligent (pretty good writing IMHO, and some great insights also IMHO), adaptive (talking about various things, most of which interest me a great deal), and deadly (sometimes you pay out pretty hard on someone/something.

2. I love it when you let some of your inner self out a bit. Usually in the form of the aforementioned great insights. I also really dig your writing style most of the time. Sometimes you seem a little off (tired, ill?), but more often than not your prose seems considered and fun to read. I often cannot wait to publish something I've just written, so I have a high number of typos and oddities, but your writing mostly seems to have these things covered.

3. I would probably simplify the design, and make the type larger. But I'm Japan-loving designery type with poor eyesight :P I would redesign it so the text is no.1, and the side bar disappears somewhat as a secondary element. Focus on the writing! (Also, your custom fonts usually take a few seconds to load on my browser, so often I'd read the headings in Arial before they snap into the fancy text. Dunno if that's just my KL net connection though.) 

Bold questions to ask. I don't think I would take the answers very well if I asked the same of my blog :S

Melissa

I would like to see David's Death Machines (because I've never seen them) and the Street Art section up and running :) I like when you tell a little bit about your day because you describe it so well that I can imagine it happening and it makes me laugh - like you trying not to cough on the train or walking and sitting in on another class when you did a photography class. Your insights about people and life in general are pretty spot on too and make interesting reading.

Neutrinos Baffling Brian

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So, in Cern the LHC - it's set up to smash atoms on the lookout for a bunch of things including the Higgs Boson right? But it seems it's thrown a theoretical cat amongst the pigeons.