Qantas Flight 741, LAX – BNE
12:23 PM (Black Mountain, NC), 2:20AM (Brisbane, Australia)
Mmmm… good travel luck: This flight to Australia is a long one, especially on top of flights from the east coast, but somehow I ended up with a bank of three seats to myself. I offered to switch with the pregnant woman across the aisle, but she said she was fine with the two seats she has, and pointed out that she’s short.
I’ve been traveling for almost twenty-three hours now (Charlotte to St. Louis to Los Angeles to Oz), and I only have four and a half left until touchdown, so I’m on the home stretch. It really hasn’t been too bad, thanks to the fortuitous seating.
I fell into conversation with an Australian woman at the gate in LAX who reminded me of a peculiar idiosyncracy of Australian speech – they have a tendency to shorten words and add an ‘o’ to the end. So ‘garbage men’ become ‘garbos,’ musicians are ‘muzos,’ etc. Added to the charming accent, it’s irresistible.
I just asked a stunningly beautiful flight attendant if I could have some water. Hearing myself ask for “wattur,” and her elegantly clarify “You’d like some wautteh?” made me feel rather pedestrian, but also made me look forward to listening to those lovely accents for a while.
Brisbane has been in drought for over ten years, and I’ve been thinking that I might need to shave my head when I move down in January just to be responsible with water (and to mark all of the other drastic changes, I guess). It turns out that it’s been raining non-stop all summer, though (our winter), and the water tables are back up, the farmers have plenty of water and all’s well, according to the woman in the airport. Maybe I should take that as divine intervention to keep Deanna from having to look at my bumpy head (what, are you suggesting that it isn’t all about me?).
The Australian woman said all the rain has everyone in Brisbane a bit ‘aggro.’ The forecast looks sunny while I’m there, though, so I’m going to go buy some sandals and enjoy a spot of late summer in my late winter. That is, after I sleep for 24 hours or so.
I took these shots of the runway with a three-second exposure from the plane window in LA…
Two things: Love the runway photos, I’ve done the same thing (well not QUITE the same…) in Cleveland, and one ended up with an amazing red heart of light.
As for Hair, I’ve been promising for years (must be 10 or 20 now..) to cut my hair and give it to those kids with cancer (I believe it is Locks of Love), but now that I’m noticing those surprising little bits of silver I dare not because I need to keep all the dark hair I’ve got! So if you DO insist on the cranial edit, please share the wealth of your gold.
—-Was sad to lose my cell phone recently (at home?) but got a new one on freecycle with a camera in it! What a cool trip, even though the shots are rather bad looking.
jts
Wow, if your planning to move there is all it takes to end a drought, there are a lot of other places you should plan to move also.
And I’m with Sandra, we love the hair!
People make fun of my accent all the time. Well, not make fun…just insist that there is no possible way for me to be a North Carolina native because I lack all traces of a NC/Southern accent. Apparently I lack all traces of any accent. I cant even fake it. Last year I worked on a part of the USBC Womens tournament that was held at the bowling alley where I worked. Everyone thought I traveled with the tournament. Nah, most I travel for that thing was the 15 minutes it takes to get from home to work.
Hair cut? Tolerable. Shaving all together? No. Seriously. One, we like the hair. Two wouldnt you want to get used to it before you subject it to an Aussie winter (by the way, I have no idea what winters there are like, and dont know how people who dont have hair deal with this other than wear hats. Just speculating…)
But if ya do, more power to ya, and post pics so we can recognize you upon your return.