A disastrous day!
Wednesday was the designated day for me to hit the research venues so I was up bright and early ready to find out more about the elusive ancestors. I decided that my first port of call would be the British Library. I could find the Stationers’ Company records for James Philips, I could look for any additional Indian information and I could visit the Captain Cook exhibition. My knee was still sore so I caught an Uber to the Library and all looked to be progressing as it should.
However, it was when I arrived at the British Library that it all went pear shaped. I had an expired Reader’s card from 2015 and had to renew. One of the things you must have is proof of address so I pulled out my wallet to hand over my driver’s licence. No licence was to be found – I searched the whole of the bag. I tried calling Kirby but no answer. So, with my metaphorical cap in hand, I went back to the registration desk to explain my dilemma.
Why didn’t Cathie just dig out a digital copy of a bank statement, electricity bill I hear you ask? Good point but you see, even though I have paid Telstra an inordinate amount of money for international roaming, for some reason there was no connection plus I couldn’t use the BL free wifi. My email address was registered from last time but I couldn’t remember the password. Again I hear you ask – so what’s the problem? Well the issue is that a reset password link gets sent to your email address and of course I couldn’t access my email.
Luckily, I encountered a very understanding person who checked out my details (luckily I had my expired card with me) and gave me a temporary card. By now, much time had elapsed, my knee was killing me and I was very worried about the loss of my licence, so I thought that I would go to the Captain Cook exhibition and find out more about his voyages.
Naturally, Murphy’s Law came into play and the exhibition had closed the day before! By now, I was totally fed up, it was after lunch so I decided to cut my losses and head back to the flat. No internet access so it was flag a cab again. The day now got worse because he took me along every road with road works or other delays. The fare in the Uber in the morning had cost me £12 and the fare back cost me £30!!
A totally depressing morning but it also gave me a chance to get my references organised for the National Archives.
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