Hooray, the long sought for and posessor of a Google cloaking device Mike Calcutt gets in touch. Man it's been years. Enough time for lots to happen, a flurry of e-mail conversation cheers me up last night. Serendipity strikes again because the copy of 'Powdered Lobster Fiasco' reminds me of him because of his rep as a Mick Murphy look-a-like! The Wallingford diaspora as Mike is now over in in the States in Washington doing his IT thang. First e-mail mentions something about writing style to check it's me. Style, where? When? Start the process of sorting the pics on Flickr and begin the process of tagging them. Early blogging experiment type thing suggests titling the things may be an idea too! Meanwhile footer around in work because I feel a little disconnected from it all. Yesterday kicked off with a cracking little FoI prob that arrived while in Egypt, dispensed advice and ran from doing the reply. Brownie point job though and that's never a bad thing. Random play on the Notpod, hooked to speakers works nicely this morning. It all makes sense to me but I suspect to other peoples ears it's a bloody mess.
4'ish and my brain and body agree it's about 6'ish. Egyptian time strikes. Dave has been feeding me coffee which has kept me going. Brief trip out this lunchtime. Monst has found the missing photos and started the mammoth task of catching up with the washing. Cal skived school today. Don't blame him. Photies to be sorted tonight.
'Powdered Lobster Fiasco' waits for me as I pick through the remains of events last week. Shove it in and try to get my head round what I have and don't have on the catalogue. Need to chat to Stevie P. I think to recreate what was the last dated update. Need to get data out to Softlink today too. Looks like a long day ahead....
Break out the Jazz Butcher and remind myself how jangle, judicous samples, feedback howl can get you through those moments when Dullsville, Warwickshire can seem exciting. Dunno why Mr. Fish seems as right for a land full of verdure as the Sisters of Mercy did for the desert the other day.
Monst continues to phone people she hasn't been able to call all week. Means she'll have run out of the need to phone anyone by the time we arrive home.
From the brief glance I've had at peoples papers seems Ashley Cole may be off, Spurs seem to be in turmoil (how this gladdens my heart!). Beyond this I know nothing. Arseblog though fills in some of the gaps though in typical robust style.
Monst and Cal bicker behind me and I find myself next to the travelling companion from Hades. He seems to want to occupy one and a half seats in his sleep. I'm not slim enough to do half a seat!
Book still in my case and not a chance of getting hold of it leads me to become a devotee of the shite corporate rags placed in some marketing hope by airlines and rail companies. 'Horus' the Egypt Air effort I managed to despatch before take off this morning. Articles on the 'Valley of the Golden Mummies', Crete and somewhere in Kent that deals with conifers. A reet rivetting read that that has me trying to find the hurl bag for a bit of amusing reading to follow. Still it had jolly jape cartoons (how they failed to make me laugh) and the duty free if you had the dollars to pay for it.
Currently I'm on a train with 'Hotline' but I've done this route so frequently recently that I've read it. It isn't bad but a more frequent refresh rate is required.
I'd blog the journey but I've done that lots too recently and much as I love to hurl invective in the direction of Milton Keynes, there is a limit to the amount I can manage.
Land at Heathrow marginally of schedule. Wait ten minutes on the tarmac to get off the plane. So probably all told about 20 minutes max behind schedule before we have the horror of waiting on the bags. Baggage took an hour to come out so I tend to suspect that the baggage handlers were on a go slow but we had a baggage handler who either had a sense of humour or alternatively who had arthritis, a limp, one arm, one leg, was given a small tricycle to transport bags between plan and reclaim and was a fan of the 'Generation Game'. Eventually it felt like only our group of weary Egyptian travellers was waiting on its bags. Big cheers of relief when Caroline's first bag appears. We dash off to the Heathrow Express.
Journey to Paddington uneventful as was the journey to Euston. It's at this point things really go silly. We grab some food, which in retrospect was a cunning plan. Later we learn that the 14.10 to Lime Street was returned to Euston. The 17.20 we're meant to be on was cancelled, so we're now on what is meant to be the 18.20 along with the other two trains. Chaos ain't the word. Makes me wonder if Branson needs a stiff talking to. Our seat reservations binned but then so are everyone elses. It's like the bad old days of British Rail.
Cal breaks out the DVD's and Monst calls Kitty. Normal service seems to be returning. Even the train shop (what happened to buffet cars, when did they become non-pc?) Is open for a selection of cold and hot snacks and alcoholic and non alcoholic drinks.
Monst attempts to wipe out the Bureau de Change by changing back the Egyptian currency but they politely tell her to sod off. She'll change it when we get back.
Security a bit bothered by the stone in my pocket but kinda accept it when they discover what is.
Airport duty free leaves me as cold as ever. Waiting hanging around when disaster strikes. No book. No books to buy, 4+ hours of flying.... Aaaaaargh!
