Incident 05.01.10

This is the first incident of 2010 for me.


So work has begun in studio and the heat is on. I have been running around like crazy, all the while drinking water on the way to keep me from passing out from all the running I've been doing.

Inevitably the time comes when I need to go to the loo to pass out all the liquid I've been ingesting. With my studio walkie in one hand and my pen and program call sheet in the other I made a bee line from the studio floor to the ladies lav.

Now I'm not a patient person - and when i gotta go i gotta go - and that day I really need to pee, you know when it springs up on you, and you know if you don't make it to the bog in time your going to be known as the woman who wet herself in the BBC.

Not taking the chance I found myself hopping in the cubicle desperately trying to figure out how to free my hands so i could pull my pants down.
My mind took a while to register any co-ordination before i clipped the walkie handset to my belt and threw the piece of paper and pen on the floor. I won't take you through all the details, but only this. I was in the toilet to pee - that was all. I hadn't eaten anything at this point so there was nothing else to pass (nasty but true) So you can imagine my confusion when I heard the unmistakable 'PLOP' below me.

I must have looked ridiculous, in a tiny cubicle, crouching (i don't sit on public toilets urgh), staring in to space with a befuddled look on my face. 'what was that?' I said to myself.

Taking the time to collect myself, when i pulled my trousers back on that i noticed there was not weight on the back pocket. My walkie handset was still attached to my belt, but i knew there had been something nestled in the rear. I turned round to investigate. LO AND BEHOLD - my Nokia 5800 Comes With Music phone in the depths of the porcelain bowl. submerged in yellow water, but not (unfortunately) beyond my rescue.

For some reason I took the time to take in what was happening. I realised i needed to get it out - but I wasn't sure if I was ready to throw my hand in there.

• Had the toilet been flushed before i had used it?
  
• was someone else's wee mixed in there with mine ?
• If I did take it out, will it smell of wee?
• Why didnt I take it out of my back pocket!!!?
• Should I radio through to the whole team to explain why I was being held up?
• Is it insured?
• Did this mean i could leave T-mobile now?
  
• did i need my phone that badly?

my pictures of Maxwell ...the numbers of people i wouldn't get from anywhere else! these are all the thoughts that perused in my mind, as the acidic liquid probably fried the electronics of my phone.

I turned to see the toilet roll and knew what had to be done. Wrapping layers of it (like it would protect me pah) round my hand, and closing my eyes I dove in.
Phone in hand I rushed to the sink and didn't even bother to take it apart. I had to make sure my hand was OK. My poor poor hand.

I must have stood there for half an hour, washing and drying and washing my hand over and over. It was upon the advice of laughing work colleagues that i then took apart my phone and dried it on the radiator. Till this hour it is not working. But i remembered my friend Mavis Bean dropped her phone in to the Cambridge canal (hilarious story but too long to tell) and a long while after she got home she threw it in to a bowl of dry rice for a few hours and it came back to life.

Thats where my precious Nokia 5800 Xpress comes with music phone is now. In a bowl of rice with the prayers of a woeful owner cradling it and trying not to cry.