The unexpected guest and laughing along with the universe

My mom met C. at the hospital where she works in Cali over three months ago when C. was there visiting her own mother, who was in the latter stages of a battle with cancer. C.'s mother died soon after. My mom befriended C. and had her over.

C. was left to fulfill her mother's wish of being buried in Izmir, her place of birth. She flew to Izmir to do this, staying on in Turkey after the burial and eventually coming up to Istanbul to visit friends here. In passing during a phone conversation my mom mentioned how she had met C. and that she was in Turkey.

My mom came to visit for a month and some of her time in Istanbul coincided with C.'s time here so we all got together for dinner and I got to meet C. Weeks later after my mom had left C. called and said she might not have a place to stay the following week because her friend would be going to the Asian side to visit her ailing father and wasn't comfortable with C. staying in the flat with her husband. So that is the short version of the web of events/connections that led C. to be my unexpected houseguest for this week and part of next.

Last night Ev, C. and I headed to Asla and Turker's for a New Year's gig. Fast forward through the turkey and almond pilav, raki, countdown, midnight kisses, tequila, etc. Around 3-4 I felt my energy flagging and decided it would be nice to have a few hours of sleep before work. So C. and I headed out, while Ev stayed on since he didn't have to work. A few minutes into the taxi ride I realized that if C. didn't have the keys I had loaned her, then we were keyless; so called Ev to find out if he had his, which he said he did. U-turn in the taxi back to Turker's, where we're met with the news that Ev also left his keys at home. Whoops! Back to the party, but rather unwillingly.

Later that morning (actually this morning), back in Turker's flat, Ev had a momentary flash of inspiration, realizing that his mom was in town and likely would have brought her key to our flat with her, yaaaaay, no hunting down a locksmith on New Year's! We called her, and sure enough, she had it, though probably wasn't so pleased to be woken up. Mehmet offered to give us a ride to Bakirkoy to get the key from Ev's mom. We hopped in, shivering in the early morning cold. He turned the key and the car coughed up a rather unpromising sound. He tried a few more times -- dead battery. Luckily the flat guard was awake and at his post and offered a jump. After charging up, we were on our way. At this point, I had already given up on trying to make it to work on time.

I'm not superstitious. So I'm not taking these incidents as a bad omen for 2009. I'd like to think the universe was playing one of its jokes on me and hoping I would laugh too.