#007: Pt.1 - Throws caution to the wind

'Unlucky' Manchester:
1. I inadvertently call the emergency services when trying to turn off the lights in the hostel bathroom. Transpires my presence in the bathroom is the only thing preventing the lights from switching off.
2. I absolutely honk my knee cap on the corner of an industrial bedframe. It hurts.
3. I leave my ipod and headphones in Hostel Castlefield. I only realise once I have walked the half hour to Hostel Ancoats.
4. It's sunny in Manchester. Sunny in Manchester. I lose a lens from my sunglasses. I know this because I was wearing them minutes before and could see nothing but lens.
5. Sequence of events with those market leaders of event ticketing, SeeTickets:
(i) See confirm dispatch of Sufjan tickets, to Maidenhead.
(ii) I contact See to inform them I cannot retrieve the ticket and instead require box office collection.
(iii) See reply saying, and I quote, if you are unable to retrieve the ticket, please contact us.
(iv) I contact See.
(v) See do nothing.
(vi) I contact See.
(vii) See say they can't do anything.
(viii) I contact See, with a breakdown of how much it has cost me to travel from Edinburgh to Manchester, and how much it has cost me to stay in Manchester, and how much it has cost me to eat in Manchester. I speculate on the cost of a 'spur-of-the-moment' ticket back to Edinburgh.
(ix) See arrange box office collection for me.

That day ended with the Sufjan gig. It might have been the best gig ever.

Manchester is followed by a brief stopover in Huddersfield with Becky, to repack (three bags is at least two bags too many). I had in mind to hire a car and head into Wales, but was convinced at the 11th hour by Kezz (PJ Harvey's biggest fan) to take one last look at ways of getting to Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona. Considerable internet searching yielded a budget flight out of Bristol in time for the start of the festival, a festival ticket in Manchester (on the way to Bristol) and a logistic-busting return flight to Luton Airport, under two hours commute to Wembley Stadium where I would have to be by 2pm the Monday after Primavera. The only missing link was somewhere to stay. And the little matter of a volcano about ready to explode...