I managed to get proper grown-up food today

I had a lovely piece of fish with grilled peppers today. This makes a large improvement over yesterday, where I ate nothing. Well, a kit kat and a squished sausage roll don't count.

Dinner didn't fare any better, which *really* pissed me off. I'll get to that in a bit. The longer I'm at this conference, the less I like it. The venue is horribly organized. I had to stand in front of my poster for 1.5 hours last night during the reception. Imagine a three-sided building. There are posters on all 3 sides. There are three bars. Only one is open, where there is booze and copious amounts of free food. Guess where most of the crowd hung out. Now imagine that my poster is diametrically opposite the bar. Yeah. I was thrilled that I actually had a few people who were genuinely interested in the poster. It's been the only good thing about the conference so far.

The plan was to go to the hotel and drop our bags off, then head into town go to eat at a cafe near the cathedral. Unfortunately, the plan morphed along the way and we ended up going to an outdoor markt near the Rathaus that serves ethnic food. By this, I mean paella, kebabs, curries, greek food, spanish tapas and burgers. You know, all the sort of food that'll kill me. People were going “we're sure you'll be able to find something you can eat”. Yeah. Like I came all the way to Vienna to eat a fucking burger (no offence to burger lovers).

One guy was actually really good about it, going to stand to stand with me, but I just didn't feel comfortable with the whole concept of street food. I'm sure it's really good, but when it can cause you severe discomfort to say the least… I just didn't want to trust it. Call me paranoid, call me silly. In the end, I told them I'd go eat something at a sit-down place I'd try to find near the cathedral and get back to them for drinks.

Unfortunately, I managed to get myself hopelessly lost (my map was in my bag, which had been left at the hotel). I know I have all the navigational aptitudes of a drunken carrier pigeon. I've never claimed otherwise. Walking in a new city at night? Not my bestest idea. In the end, I managed to get myself at the right place, but I was so stressed out about the whole thing that I wasn't really hungry anymore. Also, it was now 10pm, and the concept of a meal was no longer so appealing. I just headed back to the hotel and spent a while talking to Katy. I tried texting the guys to let them know, but on top of everything else, my phone ran out of credit.

Another sign that my hotel is shit: when I got there, I wanted nothing better than a pot of hot water to make myself some tea in my room while talking to Katy. They had no teapots. I had to pay 3 euro to get a sodding cup of bad tea and burnt myself bringing it to the room.

Today is a better day. I made myself a few ham and cheese sandwiches from the breakfast buffet and snuck them in my bag in case lunch went pear-shaped. Turns out they were not needed, which is a nice plus. Later on today, I will go walking in Vienna on my own, in daylight, with maps to go see the sights *I* want to see and do the things *I* want to do. Antisocial much? At this point, I don't give a damn.

Edit: I've already made reservations to a lovely-sounding Italian restaurant tonight. Can't wait :)