On Thursday I had a phone call from my bank, alerting me to suspicious activity on my debit card... it turned out that there were three fraudulent transactions, only one successful, and fortunately only for a relatively small sum of money, which was refunded straight way.  I had two made online payments using the card that were also stopped but, thankfully, as I have a second current account with a debit card (Jewish roots run deep!) I was able to pay for them with the second card.  But I don't know the PIN for the second card, it is very much a back-up, fall-back, last resort account (so not so Jewish after all!) and its balance is kept fairly low (around a month's money) so I couldn't simply get cash from that one.

My main bank were extremely helpful, and said if I needed to get cash all I had to do was pop into a branch... but the only one in Glasgow is in the centre of town, so a not insignificant undertaking.

Instead, I decided that I would eke out such cash as I had until the new card arrived (which I'd assumed would be early next week).  It was a healthy reminder of what it means to be restricted to cash payments and not to be able to get cash from any convenient 'hole in the wall'.  It meant thinking what I could afford to have for lunch if I was to have enough cash left for paying the cafe bill at a scheduled meet later on where it was my turn...  It meant that nipping into the shop to buy milk meant just that...  It meant that when I fancied a treat yesterday afternoon, I didn't get one because I deemed what was on offer too dear...

Every now and then people do this 'live on £1 a day' type thingy knowing fine well they have cupboards groaning with food and a credit or debit card in their pocket.  Actually being stymied for a day or three was a far more salutory experience.

My new card arrived today, and all is well... I hope, though, that I have maybe learned something that won't fade from memory so quickly.