Murphy’s law. Shit happens. Whatever you want to call it, today was my day. I’ve been traveling for ten days now and am wrapping up a tour worthy of t-shirts with a workshop in Cork. I love to set up the evening before, and upon arrival I asked if I could have access to the conference room. “Yes, that’s a workshop from 9-4:30 tomorrow?” “That’s right,” I said. I dropped my stuff off and left to hit a few sights and grab dinner before returning to the hotel. I staged the room and went to bed.

Cue this morning. Nice Irish breakfast. Reading the paper in the room waiting for attendees. 9AM came and went. 9:10 … right, well it’s not like the Irish to typically be on time. By 9:15 I sensed something was wrong, and sure enough, I was at the wrong hotel. I was at the Jury’s Inn Cork, not the Jury’s Cork Hotel. (How’s that for brand differentiation!) I nearly had a heart attack tearing down the room and racing to the right venue, stopping every two blocks to ask directions, because Cork’s roads are a one-way system from hell.

What I can’t figure out is how I booked a room, got directions from a colleague, checked-in and confirmed a workshop, etc, etc, etc and no one caught the blunder? No one took responsibility either (including me).

Either way, I became the schmo showing up one and a half hours late to lecture a group of business people on good design and service. No irony in that is there …