Lost and Found

PANIC!!! That's how my day began today. I'm flying out to Spain tomorrow for a holiday and to see my Mum and as I went to complete my online check-in this morning (something I probably should have done a long time ago) it asked me for my passport details. I reached into the 'safe place' where said passport is kept and it wasn't there. A moment of confusion passed and some scrabbling around in the vicinity of where it should be and still nothing. How could this be happening? Usually with this sort of thing, I'm so fearful of something like this happening that I over-prepare, writing check-lists of things to bring, making piles of cables etc for fear of forgetting something. The first time I went out to my Mum's house for Christmas in 2011, I forgot my laptop charger of all things. Thankfully in that instance, my step-dad had one for his work laptop that fitted, a saving grace for my sanity. This time however, there could be no such get out of jail free card. You don't have a spare passport just in case, and you can't borrow someone else's either. Cue emptying of drawers, boxes and cupboards, checking in places that are so ridiculous, they would only ever be checked in times of mild insanity (or a spring clean). I looked under the bed, under and down the back of the sofa, behind the fridge and the microwave (of all places). Nothing.