Earlier this week I lost a brand spankin’ new fangled audio recorder to some churchgoing thief that I had left regretably unattended for a few minutes, tempering what had been an enjoyable visit for an organ recital at the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles.
Yesterday, an otherwise fantastic day has been shaded by a second fail.
After a day filled with bikes and friends and awesome and bikes, involving my attendance not only at the inspiring LA Bike Summit at LA Trade Tech College, but also as part of a select group of several hundred riders accorded the opportunity of rolling Sunset Boulevard with Lance Armstrong (or at least if not directly “with,” than at least at the same time and place) and attending an after-ride event with/for him sponsored by Nike at the Ricardo Montalban Theater on Vine Street, I came home to discover I was a big loser for a second time.
This time it’s my digicam’s memory card that’s gone, containing most of my photos from the phenomenal day.
What happened was this: I ended up filling the card up capturing an extended video clip of Lance taking the stage and being pretty inspirational. So when it beeped its alert that there was no more room, I swapped it out for the one in my handlebarcam that I had taken off the bike and put in my backpack when I’d locked up upon arrival. Afterwards I put the handlebarcam away and slipped the filled memory card into the outer pocket of my backpack and went back to snapping pix and just freakin’ loving the fact that I was getting the opportunity to enjoy such a unique event. And free beers! Woot.
In spite of the rockin’ set Ben Harper was playing, fatigue set in around his third song and I split for the ride home with Ingrid and her partner Patel Kjtel. Upon arrival I eagerly went to retrieve the card from my pack to begin the download process and it was not there.
Needless to say I was pretty much filled with self-loathing that was forwarded to a fitful night of sleep that ended when I gave in and just got up at 3 a.m. to stew in my own lameness and regretfully recall some of the images I’d caught that were gone forever. The only bonus of such a pre-predawn one-way raid back into consciousness was that for the first time in my life I actually welcomed the spring forward to Daylight Savings Time. It may only be a manufactured hour on the dial but trust me, there is a gloom and despair that comes with kissing goodbye a night’s zzzzzz’s at 2 a.m. as opposed to 3 a.m. Therefore, I didn’t lose an hour so much as get to a less indecent morning hour that much quicker. Hey, I’ll take the little victories wherever I can find them.
But in between the headshaking and unspoken invectives as those wee hours slumped and staggered onward I also pieced together what I imagine happened: At some point after I put the card in that backpack pocket, I retrieved my iPhone from that same pocket to check and see who else might be Twittering from in the house. In the course of pulling out the phone I figure the card came with it and it fell to the floor.
Of course that means it might still just be there in the vicinity of my seat. And I plan on returning to the theater today with fingers crossed in hopes that, A) there’s someone such as a guard or custodian present and accessible, B) they’ll let me in to have a look-see, C) the cleaning crew either had/has the night/day off or if they were/are on duty just did a bottle pick-up as opposed to a thorough sweep, and D) the card is indeed there.
Lots of obstacles to overcome, but I gotta try.
UPDATED (2:40 p.m.): Well, guess what? I’m back to only being a one-time loser: found it! I arrived at the Ricardo Montalban Theater a little after 12:30 p.m. to find the place wide open, and an employee telling me to go ahead and look, but warning me that the clean-up had already taken place. Not only that but she said the house was full dark in the midst of some sort of tech rehearsal — literally pitch black. So I detached one of my bike headlights and used that to help me make my way to the section I’d been sitting. A first pass yielded nothing. Next I scanned the floor of the row in front of me. Nothing. Coming back to my row, I went hands and knees and did a methodical look-around. And there it was, half wedged beneath a grate cover under the seat in front of mine. Oh happy day!
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