Lost

              Sometimes, even when I have every reason and opportunity to be a competent adult, I find new and exciting ways to screw it up; even with things as simple as driving home the exact same way that I do every single day after work.  I went out for a co-worker’s going away party and to watch the Blues’ playoff game.  Since I live so far from work, I was obligated to stay out until the hockey game was over, because I would have missed a good chunk of the game on the drive one (priorities).   This means that I didn’t start driving home until nearly midnight and at some point during the drive my brain shut off for a few minutes and I ended up lost.  Luckily, I made some handy maps to illustrate how stupid I am and what was (or wasn’t) going through my brain at each point.   The biggest problem was that, for whatever reason, I thought I was on a different highway than I was actually on.  And things just kind of spiraled out of control from there.

First, let’s take a look at how I was supposed to be getting home.  This is how I get home literally every single day (Note: the starting points on all these maps is not where I started my journey, just where I started screwing up).

Now we’ll look at how I apparently thought I was getting home.

 

And here is how that confusion happened.

A.      Where I thought I was

B.      The exit I thought I missed

C.      Where I actually was

D.      The exit I actually just passed

E.       The exit I actually needed.

And here is whatever the hell was going through my mind as I Ferdinand Magellan’d my way around.

1.       Oh no, did I just pass my exit?  I just passed my exit.  Idiot.  It’s fine; I’ll just grab the next one.  I can get home from there

2.       That exit sign seemed weird.

3.       This is fine. I know where I’m at.

4.       Isn’t there supposed to be a Jack in the Box here?   No problem, I’m sure I’ll recognize something.

5.       None of this looks familiar.  Maybe it’ll make sense if I just keep going.

6.       WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS ROUNDABOUT?! WHERE AM I?!

7.       I RECOGNIZE THIS HOSPITAL BUT I HAVE NO IDEA HOW THE FUCK I GOT HERE OR HOW TO GET HOME NOW.

8.       Holy shit, I know where I am now.  How the hell did I get here?

9.       Seriously, how the hell did I end up here?  Roads are hard.

10.   I literally have no idea how those roads even got me here right now.  But at least I know how to get home from here.

So finally, this is how I actually made it home last night.

                And I really don’t think this story would be complete without mentioning that during my downward spiral of confusion I was texting my buddy Düdders.  I think it does a great job of illustrating the fact that my brain had just jumped ship entirely.

-Ryan