Harry Potter And The Half Wasted Day

Sunday and Carols brother Robert and his wife Karen had offered to babysit Harry & Ben so Carol & I can go and see the new Harry Potter movie at Basingstoke.

Now I booked seats online a week before for 2pm, when we dropped the boys off at Robert and Karens house, Robert said he thought we had booked it for 1pm.

It was 12.30pm and I quickly checked the times on Roberts computer. I couldn't see the 2pm showing listed, so I assumed it was the 1pm booking and I had got it wrong.

So we raced off to Basingstoke, only to get to Festival Place to be told that the car park was full and we got diverted. It was 1pm ! - So we drove round to the other entrance to Festival Place and got in and parked. Ran through the shopping centre and got to the Cinema at 1.20pm. Got to the 'Queue Jumpers' machine and swiped my card. The tickets came out stating the time for our showing was in fact 2pm - so panic over. We went upstairs and got pop corn and a drink. At 1.45pm we could go in and take out allotted seats.

We walked up the steps in our screen and there was a family of three sat in our seats !!!

So I politely said 'I am sorry but you appear to be sitting in our seats' and showed the guy our tickets.

He smiled back and said 'Er no, these are our seats' and he produces identical tickets to mine !

So we want back into the lobby and spoke to a member of staff, who appologised and stated that we weren't the first to have this problem today. There had been a fault with the online booking service and lots of seats were double booked.

So we got a refund on our tickets, a refund on our concessions and two free tickets to come back some other time to see our film. Great :-(

So we decided to have a nice meal instead, went downstairs to Ciao Baby Cucina Which is a lovely Italian Resturant. It was packed, so we waited by the front door to be seated. Just as the waiter approached us a guy pushes past and says 'A table for five' - I am just about to say something to the waiter when a lady behind me says, can't you move in further so we can get in through the door'

I said'Well we were about to get a table but that gentleman just pushed in front of us, so we are still waiting to be seated' The young lady next to the woman says' That gentlemans my father'

I replied 'Well go and teach him some manners then'

It was so busy in there Carol & I realised it would be ages before we got a table, so we left in disgust, not at the restuarant because they are great, but at the rude family.

There are several other restuarants nearby but they were all really packed out.

In the end Carol & had a iced bun and a drink in Marks and Spencers Cafe and then went and did some shopping.

It wasn't a total waste of a day, Carol got three pairs of trousers in the sales at £3.99 each ! - and I bought a DVD for £6.99 which was priced at £17 in the shop round the corner :-)

We came to get our parking ticket paid at the machine, which promptly ate it. Luckily the parking attendant was there and tried three more times to get our ticket/money through the ticket machine, which didn't work. In the meantime about 8 people all got their tickets endorsed in the machine adjacent to ours and had left. Eventually the guy said, sorry I can't get your ticket out, just drive to the exit barrier and tell them 'Kirby says to let you out' - So parking was free as well :-)

So some good did come out of it, but we really wanted to see our film. I guess better luck next time !