Wednesday, January 18, 2006
riding the monsoon
Hydee hodee everbody... as a famous Australian game show host used to say... I've arrived back in the green land of torrential rain and dancing frill-necked lizards. Yes friends I'm back in beautiful Darwin and the monsoons are in full spate. Everything is lush and every shade of green imaginable.
My brother took me to the airport and being the nice guy he is, insisted on dragging my largest suitcase to the check-in and depositing it on the baggage conveyor - whereupon he declared it was officially the heaviest bag ever in the history of the world - but that's only because he didn't carry it to the airport when I took it from Sydney to Canberra - when it weighed 45 kilos - this time is was only 32 kilos.
I had two other bags as well and, although one was small enough to carry onto the plane, I needed to pay excess baggage charges for the other. The girl who booked me in was a real sourpuss but the excess baggage man was much nicer. "Oh I'll give you a better seat," he says. "You are way down the back of the plane, there's a spare window seat in the first couple of rows you can have." He proceeds to change my seat allocation. "How nice," I think, until I get on the plane and see my seating companion, a man well over 6ft in height and at least twice the width of the seat. This meant my 4.5 hour flight was spent trying to bend myself around his arms and legs which were taking up about 1/3 of my seating space. At least he was pleasant and didn't smell. Once before I got sat next to a man of similar proportions. You have to picture that I'm only 5 ft 4 inches tall and my head therefore is on the level of these guys' armpits, which can be really bad news when they are not close friends with a deodorant.
Fortunately a kind friend met me at the airport and carried my bags up to my first floor unit, otherwise I'd have been unpacking at the bottom of the stairs and relaying the contents up by the armfull! Sigh... one of my goals in life is to learn how to pack light!
Checked out both my local markets at the weekend to reacquaint myself with the delights of Darwin and pretty much spent the rest of the weekend cleaning and unpacking, then off to work on Monday.
It's been great to have a break and a change and I hope I'm invigorated for the challenges of the year ahead.
My new year's resolution last year was to be less serious about life and learn to laugh more - this year's is to become enigmatic. I'm still working on last year's and don't expect this year's to be any more successful - guess you can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse in just 12 months!
Hope I still have a reader or two left. If I get back into this blogging, I might have to have a membership drive - any ideas out there?
Wishing you all a 2006 that sees at least one of your dearest wishes come true.
My brother took me to the airport and being the nice guy he is, insisted on dragging my largest suitcase to the check-in and depositing it on the baggage conveyor - whereupon he declared it was officially the heaviest bag ever in the history of the world - but that's only because he didn't carry it to the airport when I took it from Sydney to Canberra - when it weighed 45 kilos - this time is was only 32 kilos.
I had two other bags as well and, although one was small enough to carry onto the plane, I needed to pay excess baggage charges for the other. The girl who booked me in was a real sourpuss but the excess baggage man was much nicer. "Oh I'll give you a better seat," he says. "You are way down the back of the plane, there's a spare window seat in the first couple of rows you can have." He proceeds to change my seat allocation. "How nice," I think, until I get on the plane and see my seating companion, a man well over 6ft in height and at least twice the width of the seat. This meant my 4.5 hour flight was spent trying to bend myself around his arms and legs which were taking up about 1/3 of my seating space. At least he was pleasant and didn't smell. Once before I got sat next to a man of similar proportions. You have to picture that I'm only 5 ft 4 inches tall and my head therefore is on the level of these guys' armpits, which can be really bad news when they are not close friends with a deodorant.
Fortunately a kind friend met me at the airport and carried my bags up to my first floor unit, otherwise I'd have been unpacking at the bottom of the stairs and relaying the contents up by the armfull! Sigh... one of my goals in life is to learn how to pack light!
Checked out both my local markets at the weekend to reacquaint myself with the delights of Darwin and pretty much spent the rest of the weekend cleaning and unpacking, then off to work on Monday.
It's been great to have a break and a change and I hope I'm invigorated for the challenges of the year ahead.
My new year's resolution last year was to be less serious about life and learn to laugh more - this year's is to become enigmatic. I'm still working on last year's and don't expect this year's to be any more successful - guess you can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse in just 12 months!
Hope I still have a reader or two left. If I get back into this blogging, I might have to have a membership drive - any ideas out there?
Wishing you all a 2006 that sees at least one of your dearest wishes come true.
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