I forgot to mention that the other day, sitting on the verandah at mum’s care home, I almost had my ear nibbled by a kangaroo. It was standing behind me as I sat and waited for mum and Tracey to return from mum’s room. As Tracey opened the sliding door she suddenly stopped and, very quietly told me to slowly turn around. As I began to move my head, the kangaroo hopped away, along the side of the swampy gully before heading up to the bush. I saw it as it bounced passed me.
All in all, it’s been an odd two weeks. It was mostly sedentary yet productive and interesting. For one thing, I have discovered just how much I enjoy sharing in other people’s stories. They are like little snatches of self edited biography. They are interesting even when they’re not, mainly because they are generally concerning things outside my own life experiences.
Anyway, leaving the philosophy to one side for a bit, the first half of my very lengthy Friday flight back home, was spent surrounded by the occasional sleeping form, glowing TV screens and a crying child one seat behind me.
I discovered, while the plane was moving bumpity bump through outside turbulence and the inside was being buffeted with waves of screaming child, that The Violent Femmes is a good way to blot out extraneous noise and encourage sleep.
Between fitful episodes of snooze, I finished watching the latest series of The Walking Dead – some would say it was also an episode of snoozing – then started on a Brazilian series called Most Beautiful Thing which was promising to be a lot of fun.
Then, at 6am in Hong Kong, we approached for landing at 570mph; the temperature was a tepid 24° and the sky densely cloudy…not that I had a lot of time for weather watching.
I was a tad concerned that the transfer at Hong Kong would be tricky, given my crappy mobility. I was a tad concerned when the in-flight display refused to show which gate and transfer should be used for my connecting flight as it generally does. I was a tad concerned when everyone in front of me decided to either stop suddenly and tie a shoelace or go to great effort to make my journey as slalom-like as possible by randomly pointing at toilets, shops or people tying their shoe laces. I needn’t have been concerned any single bit.
I sailed through the transfer and came out almost opposite Gate 5 which, coincidentally, was exactly where I had to be. I wandered around for about half and hour then sat down and waited for an hour which became an hour and a half because of some operational difficulties refusing passenger entry to the plane. Actually, while I waited for boarding to commence, the number of impatient business types huffling and puffling around me in impotent anguish and dire upset bordering on outright screams of injustice, made me feel very much happier about the presumably unavoidable delay.
Eventually I once more started watching my new favourite Brazilian TV show until I’d finished all episodes in series 1. There seriously needs to be a series 2!
Following fits, starts and snoozes, we landed at Heathrow half an hour late and I discovered my taxi driver home was to be the most despised cab driver in Farnham. Talk about unlucky. Normally I get the coach and train but this time thought Mirinda would prefer me to get home. Never again.
Home was, eventually, the loveliest place to be and I was greeted by two manic puppies, a wife on the phone then, after a bit, Fi.
And, delightfully, I had my dinner cooked for me by my wonderful sister-in-law. (The size of her quiche just had to be seen to be believed.)
