communication, mis, for the use of

So, I'm co-ordinating our local SCA event next weekend, which basically means booking the hall, which we rent from the nice Round Table people in Claremont. However, the process has taken nearly a month, and has reduced me to a state of pitiful whimpering and chewing the linoleum. The e-mail communication has gone as follows:

(Late February) ME: Please can we have the hall for 1 & 2 April? That's the Saturday and Sunday?
HIM: OK, but I have to check if the Scouts are using it on Friday.
ME (patiently): But we don't want it on Friday.
(A week passes).
ME: Um, about that hall...?
HIM: Oh, yes, I haven't been able to get hold of the lady who runs the Scouts, so I still don't know if they need it on Friday.
ME: But we don't want it on Friday!
(A week passes).
ME: Hello? Hall...?
HIM: no response.
< sounds of linoleum being chewed >
(A week passes)
ME: HELLO??? HALL???
HIM: Oh, sorry, I've been out of town. Will really contact that Scout lady right now!
ME: BUT WE DON'T WANT THE HALL ON FRIDAY!!!
(A week passes)
ME (in calm, reasoned tones): About that hall. That we want on 1&2 April. Which, may I point out, does not include a Friday.
HIM: Oh! I didn't realise you didn't want it on Friday. Sorry. Yes, of course, it's fine, you can have it no problem.
ME: AAAAAAARGH!

But I'm much better now, really. I suppose I shouldn't be totally amazed by the discovery that a sizeable proportion of the educated strata of the human race doesn't, in fact, actually know how to read. I teach a lot of them, after all.

I cooked duck for the first time last night, naturally enough for jo&stv. There is, and I am being restrained here, a LOT of fat in a duck. I pride myself on hopeless overcatering, but last night the overall richness of the meal had the assembled post-dinner hordes lying on the sofa groaning and refusing dessert, which was an interestingly bubbling tar-pit chocolate pudding I'd just invented. My work here is done.