Why I wouldn't make a good navigator!!

I have a pair of these cute little embroidered "Aladdin" shoes on display in my entrance way. My mum bought herself a pair when she was here in January to display on her hall table when she got back home. Of course this has generated interest from a couple of family members so mum emailed me a request to get some more to bring home with me when we visit in July, plus a full sized pair for one of my uncles.

Now, you are probably wondering what this has to do with navigating, right? Read on!

On Saturday I decided that I had better drive in to Bur Dubai to get these shoes since we fly out on our trip next week. Saturday is usually quieter on the roads here as it is still the weekend for a fair part of the expat population. I have probably done this trip two or three times now on my own - it's not very difficult and I have the directions written down in my trusty little notebook that is always in my bag. I dropped the kids off at school, came home, walked the dog, showered, dressed and was on the road by about 9.30am. Figured it would take me about half an hour to get into the city and find a park, 15 minutes to find the stall, buy what I needed, get back to the car and be on my way home. I had hoped to be back home by about 10.45am even a little earlier. Maybe get a couple of hours stitching in before doing the afternoon school run?!

Anyway, I'm tootling along the five laned racetrack freeway listening to my favourite CD and feeling alright with the world. The traffic was reasonable and whilst there were a couple of maniac drivers on the road they were well away from me and things were hunky dory. As I got closer to my destination I made sure I was in the correct lane so I could make the appropriate left hand turn when it came up. This is when things started to go a little pear-shaped - lol! I knew I was getting close to where I had to make my turn but the road started to look a little unfamiliar (there had been some roadworks and there were some signs that weren't there last time) - I checked my notebook to reassure myself - it said to keep left so I told myself I was okay and kept going. If I went right then I was going to end up near Wafi Mall where I buy my DMC threads and that's not where I wanted to be.

After going under one too many underpasses and seeing signs for one of the bridges that crosses the Creek I finally realised that I may have missed my turn! It turns out that I was heading to Sharjah which is the next emirate over! Definitely not where I wanted to go! Okay, I say, no problems, just take the next u-turn or exit and head back the right way! Hah! Easier said than done! There are no u-turns or exits in the direction I need to go (that I was familiar with anyway)! Thankfully, Sharjah is only a 35-45 minute drive and I had a full tank of petrol because that is where I ended up before finally seeing a sign to a road I knew which would take me in the direction I wanted to go. I eventually got back on track, got to the souk and bought the shoes (pic of my haul below). It just took twice as long!! I worked out where and why I went wrong on my second time around though so I didn't make the same mistake twice. With the roadworks they'd changed the last two left hand lanes of the racetrack freeway to go straight ahead so now I have to veer a little to the right before I make my left hand turn. If I stick to the middle lane next time I should be okay. This is why I would not make a good navigator. I am not good with directions and I cringe when anyone asks me how to get somewhere. I am very clearly geographically challenged!!



Now on to stitching stuff :) I managed to ignore Shimmer's pleas and continued working on Verdure. I did not achieve a lot of progress but it is progress nonetheless :)



I also put in a few stitches on The Dreaming. This WIP resides by my computer so whenever I am browsing blogs or the HAED BB I try to put in a couple of stitches on this piece.



I have also made some progress on my Long Dog Sampler, St Georges. It will be my travel piece whilst we are travelling over the first half of summer. I also keep it in my rather large shoulder bag just in case I find myself with a few minutes to spare while out and about :)

Last but not least, I picked up my Snowflake QS! The HAED BB is having a Fairy Day SAL and she will be my project for that as well as Wednesday's QS SAL :) The pic shows my progress before picking her up this week.

Well, Blogger Photos is being its usual pain in the butt self and not letting me upload the last two photos so I will add them later. I'm off to have a drink!