Grammar of this sentence

Question

For full context see this document, Exercise 7.

According to my textbook, the brackets have to be filled with:

1 ただ

2 すると

3 つぎつぎに

4 せっかく

5 ぜったいに

The sentence in question is the one at the very bottom.

せっかく三十分も早く行ったのに、約束の時間に遅れるし、友人には買いたくないなら、ぜったいにそんなことを言ってはいけないと注意されるし、大変な一日だった。

I'd interprete it as follows:

"Because I didn't make it in time even though I went to great pains to be 30 minutes early and because I was warned by my husband that I must not say that I don't want to buy anything, it was a horrible day."

I feel a bit unsure about my interpretation because there are several clauses embedded into each other. Maybe you can confirm whether I did it right or not.

Answer 1

Let's split it into four parts like this:

1. せっかく三十分も早く行ったのに、
   Although I went to all the trouble to go to the place 30 minutes earlier,
2. 約束の時間に遅れるし、
   I was late for the appointment,
3. 友人には「買いたくないなら、ぜったいにそんなことを言ってはいけない」と注意されるし、
   my friend warned me saying "If you don't want to buy anything, you must never say such a thing",
4. 大変な一日だった。
   (so) it was a terrible day.

Note:

• 友人 is "friend", not "husband".
• 買いたくないなら is "if you don't want to buy".
• そんなこと ("such a thing") refers to ちょっと贈り物を探しているんです.
• The two ～し are explained in this article. Using "because" is not too far, but usually it can be translated naturally without explicitly saying "because".