mkingdon
Obsessed...and admits it!!
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2002
- Messages
- 408
Previously on this tour...
Introduction
Day One Monday August 20th 2007
The last few weeks leading up to this day had dragged like an Omnibus edition of Songs of Praise, and I really could not see today ever arriving.
Then suddenly, here we were, with a full weekend of packing and manic house tidying behind us, (so it is clean when we get back apparently) we are exhausted and just about ready.
I wake up at about 5.30am, and I’m greeted by a nice trail of blood on my pillow. I suspect Louise has been playing her "pin the nail on the donkey" game during the night again…but no, the nasty mess on the pillow (no, not me) is linked to a grave and horrific shaving incident last night.
I had opted to have a wet shave last night, to really get that chiselled Brad Pitt look…but after taking off half my bottom lip with the razor, I had spent the next few hours trying to stop the flow of blood, and wondering if A&E would be busier here or in Florida.
Eventually the blood ceased, and I went to bed, but the result was that I woke up looking like a cross between Leslie Ash and that bloke who used to save rain forests with Sting!
I slumber on until about 6.45 when Louise’s “getting ready” routine became too noisy to ignore, and I shower. Oh I probably had a wee first…too much detail??
As I mentioned, Louise had said that we were not doing silly eating this trip as she wanted to maintain her new found figure…so in the spirit of that I just had four slices of toast to keep me going until we got to the airport. Having eaten the last of the bread, the kids cobbled together some breakfast from the remains of the fridge contents….one half eaten Easter Egg and a clove of garlic. It’ll do them no harm.
After the usual unplugging of everything and the zipping up of anything not moving we are ready for the off.
So as tradition dictates, the girls were marshalled into position for their photograph, and look how happy they were about it.
My Dad turned up at 8.00am as arranged to take us to the airport, and with only a minor wrestle with the cases and kids we were all in, and on our way. I handed Louise the front door key and said “Put that somewhere you can find it when we get back”. It might be worth making a note of that for later.
The traffic was annoyingly worse than we had expected, but still we arrived at the airport at 9.05 and said our goodbyes. Due to the idiots at Glasgow airport and their attempt to disrupt the western world by crashing a second hand car into a doorway, Dad had to drop us off about a mile from the check in area. Naturally no trolleys were provided to assist travellers with their luggage so I dragged and sweated and all the way to the main building, swearing about every five steps.
Check in had opened at 8.30, which spookily was when I thought we would arrive, so now we had a queue to deal with. It was the slowest queue known to man, until the next queue I come across that is, and it takes a while to get to the front.
A couple of “special” passengers make a point of moving us to one side so they can access the “special” check in desk for “special” people, in a very loud voice. More fool them…if we crash, they’ll be right at the front, whereas us oiks, further back, will be perfectly safe!!
Whilst in the queue I had a look around at our fellow passengers, and was duly entertained by the antics of a very bad wig on the bloke behind us. I feel qualified to judge this particular subject, as it could be of some relevance should I ever start to lose my hair!
This thing looked horrendous, and moved independently of the bloke’s head. Very silly. I think it is still in quarantine State side to be honest, as they Immigration people suspected it to be livestock.
As we get to the check in desk we are greeted and asked for our tickets etc. As I load the first case on to the measuring thing, she tuts and takes in breath.
“Ooh, that is too ‘eavy that one. It is 33 kilos. For health and safety reasons it has to be less that 32 kilos”
I suspect this is because the chaps in the back can’t get it airborne above that weight.
So we have to empty some of the bits from that case into the other cases and some into hand luggage. Ryan takes it like a man.
Now we are rid of the cases, we decide to walk to Terminal 1 as Terminal 2 is quite frankly…crap. First though, a quick stop at Travelex, for some dollars.
Oh, and also first, or is that second now….we restroom for the first time…well Louise does anyway, and we wait…a long time.
The girls are armed with “cushties” for the flight. I am carrying my cushtie around my waist disguised as love handles.
It is a bit of a hike though, but there are moving walkways, which would be helpful if people didn’t just stand on them, and wait to be transported to their destination at 2 miles per hour. Are we the only ones who want to walk on these walkways and get there twice as quickly?
Anyway, we make it to T1, and the need for food is quite critical now, as my four pieces of toast were quite literally hours ago.
We chose Garfunkels as it was
a) Nearest
b) Open
And it is not busy at all, so we are seated immediately and place our orders.
I have a very light and healthy Bacon Buttie, with an orange juice and a coffee (not in the same glass)
Rebecca has the same minus the coffee (she only “does” Starbucks you see)
Emily has a Sausage Buttie (they were called butties, I am not that uncouth really)
And Louise, being all healthy has a Full English!
Here we are pretending not to be hungry, waiting for the food.
As you can see I take better photos than Louise does.
It was all very good, and the orange juice was delicious and obviously just freshly squeezed. When I saw on the bill they were £2.50 each, I think we bought the tree as well.
That lot cost us £27.
Suitably stuffed we wander back to T2 and join the queue for security. They were sold out of security so we just went through the x-ray machines anyway. Emily beeped, her worst fears realised…she cursed her new Fall Out Boy belt..or was it her Fall Out Boy jacket…no, I think it was her Fall Out Boy T shirt….something had metal in it anyway..ah yes her seventeen piercings!!
First stop was Waterstones for a book for me. I quickly chose Hippopotamus by Stephen Fry, and I think the kids got some Hannah Montana and High School Musical books, thinking I would believe they will read anything longer than a menu this holiday.
Louise wanted to “look round” the duty free shop at this point, so we three followed her round looking bored and tired for a bit until she dismissed us to Starbucks, whilst she sprayed on every sampler in the shop.
Little did she know that I had her boarding card so any attempt to purchase anything would be thwarted.
So I take the girls to Starbucks feeling safe and smug. Having spent a tenner on three “coffees” I feel slightly less smug, but the girls enjoy their Banana Java Chips anyway, and I had a crap Cappuccino.
Rebecca said she felt sick at this point, which is not surprising having tasted her “drink”. She wanders off with Emily to the loos, and they return shortly having bumped into Mum who is currently burning effigies of me as I have her boarding pass and her attempt to purchase something has been thwarted.
I quickly chose life and hand over the boarding card, and send it off to Louise via a safe intermediary (Rebecca). Rebecca returns with another message…
“Can you get Mum a coffee please, she’ll be back in a minute”
I turn to look at the Starbucks menu, and decide the chances of me predicting what she might want from the 637 options on the board are slim, and she can choose when she gets back.
When she did get back the damage was fairly light as she had only bought some P20 sun lotion and some perfume (is it just me who thinks they all smell the same?).
After getting Louise her chosen drink, we head for WH Smiths for magazines, sweets etc. We still don’t know what gate we are boarding at so we wander about a bit, and by chance stumble across our plane at what turns out to be our gate.
We take some seats in the café opposite, and Louise “lets me” buy her a beer. It was £3, flat, warm and disgusting. People queued to get on for ages, and we joined them at 1.15, already resigned to not leaving at the intended 1.30 as the organisation of the queue and boarding was a farce. There were about three queues. Two of which going nowhere, and the one we finally found that worked had some muppet at the head of it with a “problem” of some sort.
He could not possibly have known my level of hatred for him at that point….what??? No I am not over reacting!!
Finally we are seated on row 28. Louise and the girls have the window seat and the two adjacent and I am on the aisle of the block of four in the middle. I am sat next to a lady whose name turns out to be Jack….it was either Jumping Jack or Jack in the Box, because her backside made contact with her seat for about seven minutes of the whole flight.
As we are preparing to take off the cabin crew make an announcement, asking that nobody on board get their nuts out.
I am surprised they are holding such a grudge from last year, as it was an accident, and some people seemed quite please anyway….
It turns out, someone had a severe nut allergy, and if anyone so much as opened a back of dry roasted their head would explode…or something like that.
We take off at about 2pm.
The films were Shrek 3 and Spiderman 3…neither of which I watched due to having to get up out of my seat every seventeen seconds, plus I had seen Shrek and I don’t like the Spiderman films.
So for the next nine hours or so we flew.
The food was OK…some sort of chicken thing with mash and veg. The kids had kids meals which were meatballs and pasta. Emily will never eat anything other than sweets and Pringles on a plane, but Rebecca had a bash at it. The kids meal dessert was...a Mars Bar!! So I helped with that.
The flight really dragged, but I effortlessly completed the Visa Waiver forms despite Mrs Nudge McNudger next to me, and the kids asking me “are we there yet?” every ten minutes. I am such a pro.
We finally land at 5.45pm local time, and we’re off the plane pretty quickly. Immigration is fully staffed, but Emily is fully loaded and needs the loo desperately, having held it for the entire flight. She has a thing about plane toilets…she prefers patterned ones….No? Ok, never mind.
So Louise rushes her to the loo and Rebecca and I join the queue. They return just in time and we are through and stamped painlessly, and into baggage reclaim.
We have three cases, and two appear immediately. The third of course is being held back by the bloke behind the curtain whilst he and his mates have a good laugh. Finally it arrives after about ten minutes and we are away.
We just beat the main rush into Dollar (I always preferred Bucks Fizz to be honest), and I wait with Rebecca.
Now, I had ordered a two door economy, being fairly sure that these do not exist. Now as I wait to be seen, the question is can I hold my nerve and not go for the upgrade. I am summoned forward, and after a brief tussle over my own insurance policy, and the guy (Kevin) blatantly lying to me that it didn’t include stuff that was there in black and white on the policy in front of us both, I decided he could whistle for his upgrade and I was very firm, if you’ll pardon the expression.
He tells me the car we are getting is the size of a Corsa back home. Never having seen a car that small on an US road I don’t believe him. Furthermore we have been driven to Manchester airport in a Golf, with an extra body in it, so I think I’ll take my chances, Kev, old buddy, old mate.
So he gives in, takes just 40 or so dollars for the gas and lets me go. I am really keen at this point to see what we ended up with, having a mental picture of a 2 door Smart Car, so I encourage our party to Row A where the chariot awaits.
It is hot of course, very hot, and as I fight the urge to sprint to the car, as Louise is pushing the trolley of cases, I am held back by Louise “needing” to get a drink from the vending machine, right now, this minute, it will not wait.
So I have to delve around in Ryan to find some US money, and then some change that fits the machine, and then…well quite frankly it was all just taking too long. Finally we have the holy grail that is a bottle of diet coke, and we race right to the bottom of the row A.
Continued.....
Introduction
Day One Monday August 20th 2007
The last few weeks leading up to this day had dragged like an Omnibus edition of Songs of Praise, and I really could not see today ever arriving.
Then suddenly, here we were, with a full weekend of packing and manic house tidying behind us, (so it is clean when we get back apparently) we are exhausted and just about ready.
I wake up at about 5.30am, and I’m greeted by a nice trail of blood on my pillow. I suspect Louise has been playing her "pin the nail on the donkey" game during the night again…but no, the nasty mess on the pillow (no, not me) is linked to a grave and horrific shaving incident last night.
I had opted to have a wet shave last night, to really get that chiselled Brad Pitt look…but after taking off half my bottom lip with the razor, I had spent the next few hours trying to stop the flow of blood, and wondering if A&E would be busier here or in Florida.
Eventually the blood ceased, and I went to bed, but the result was that I woke up looking like a cross between Leslie Ash and that bloke who used to save rain forests with Sting!
I slumber on until about 6.45 when Louise’s “getting ready” routine became too noisy to ignore, and I shower. Oh I probably had a wee first…too much detail??
As I mentioned, Louise had said that we were not doing silly eating this trip as she wanted to maintain her new found figure…so in the spirit of that I just had four slices of toast to keep me going until we got to the airport. Having eaten the last of the bread, the kids cobbled together some breakfast from the remains of the fridge contents….one half eaten Easter Egg and a clove of garlic. It’ll do them no harm.
After the usual unplugging of everything and the zipping up of anything not moving we are ready for the off.
So as tradition dictates, the girls were marshalled into position for their photograph, and look how happy they were about it.
My Dad turned up at 8.00am as arranged to take us to the airport, and with only a minor wrestle with the cases and kids we were all in, and on our way. I handed Louise the front door key and said “Put that somewhere you can find it when we get back”. It might be worth making a note of that for later.
The traffic was annoyingly worse than we had expected, but still we arrived at the airport at 9.05 and said our goodbyes. Due to the idiots at Glasgow airport and their attempt to disrupt the western world by crashing a second hand car into a doorway, Dad had to drop us off about a mile from the check in area. Naturally no trolleys were provided to assist travellers with their luggage so I dragged and sweated and all the way to the main building, swearing about every five steps.
Check in had opened at 8.30, which spookily was when I thought we would arrive, so now we had a queue to deal with. It was the slowest queue known to man, until the next queue I come across that is, and it takes a while to get to the front.
A couple of “special” passengers make a point of moving us to one side so they can access the “special” check in desk for “special” people, in a very loud voice. More fool them…if we crash, they’ll be right at the front, whereas us oiks, further back, will be perfectly safe!!
Whilst in the queue I had a look around at our fellow passengers, and was duly entertained by the antics of a very bad wig on the bloke behind us. I feel qualified to judge this particular subject, as it could be of some relevance should I ever start to lose my hair!
This thing looked horrendous, and moved independently of the bloke’s head. Very silly. I think it is still in quarantine State side to be honest, as they Immigration people suspected it to be livestock.
As we get to the check in desk we are greeted and asked for our tickets etc. As I load the first case on to the measuring thing, she tuts and takes in breath.
“Ooh, that is too ‘eavy that one. It is 33 kilos. For health and safety reasons it has to be less that 32 kilos”
I suspect this is because the chaps in the back can’t get it airborne above that weight.
So we have to empty some of the bits from that case into the other cases and some into hand luggage. Ryan takes it like a man.
Now we are rid of the cases, we decide to walk to Terminal 1 as Terminal 2 is quite frankly…crap. First though, a quick stop at Travelex, for some dollars.
Oh, and also first, or is that second now….we restroom for the first time…well Louise does anyway, and we wait…a long time.
The girls are armed with “cushties” for the flight. I am carrying my cushtie around my waist disguised as love handles.
It is a bit of a hike though, but there are moving walkways, which would be helpful if people didn’t just stand on them, and wait to be transported to their destination at 2 miles per hour. Are we the only ones who want to walk on these walkways and get there twice as quickly?
Anyway, we make it to T1, and the need for food is quite critical now, as my four pieces of toast were quite literally hours ago.
We chose Garfunkels as it was
a) Nearest
b) Open
And it is not busy at all, so we are seated immediately and place our orders.
I have a very light and healthy Bacon Buttie, with an orange juice and a coffee (not in the same glass)
Rebecca has the same minus the coffee (she only “does” Starbucks you see)
Emily has a Sausage Buttie (they were called butties, I am not that uncouth really)
And Louise, being all healthy has a Full English!
Here we are pretending not to be hungry, waiting for the food.
As you can see I take better photos than Louise does.
It was all very good, and the orange juice was delicious and obviously just freshly squeezed. When I saw on the bill they were £2.50 each, I think we bought the tree as well.
That lot cost us £27.
Suitably stuffed we wander back to T2 and join the queue for security. They were sold out of security so we just went through the x-ray machines anyway. Emily beeped, her worst fears realised…she cursed her new Fall Out Boy belt..or was it her Fall Out Boy jacket…no, I think it was her Fall Out Boy T shirt….something had metal in it anyway..ah yes her seventeen piercings!!
First stop was Waterstones for a book for me. I quickly chose Hippopotamus by Stephen Fry, and I think the kids got some Hannah Montana and High School Musical books, thinking I would believe they will read anything longer than a menu this holiday.
Louise wanted to “look round” the duty free shop at this point, so we three followed her round looking bored and tired for a bit until she dismissed us to Starbucks, whilst she sprayed on every sampler in the shop.
Little did she know that I had her boarding card so any attempt to purchase anything would be thwarted.
So I take the girls to Starbucks feeling safe and smug. Having spent a tenner on three “coffees” I feel slightly less smug, but the girls enjoy their Banana Java Chips anyway, and I had a crap Cappuccino.
Rebecca said she felt sick at this point, which is not surprising having tasted her “drink”. She wanders off with Emily to the loos, and they return shortly having bumped into Mum who is currently burning effigies of me as I have her boarding pass and her attempt to purchase something has been thwarted.
I quickly chose life and hand over the boarding card, and send it off to Louise via a safe intermediary (Rebecca). Rebecca returns with another message…
“Can you get Mum a coffee please, she’ll be back in a minute”
I turn to look at the Starbucks menu, and decide the chances of me predicting what she might want from the 637 options on the board are slim, and she can choose when she gets back.
When she did get back the damage was fairly light as she had only bought some P20 sun lotion and some perfume (is it just me who thinks they all smell the same?).
After getting Louise her chosen drink, we head for WH Smiths for magazines, sweets etc. We still don’t know what gate we are boarding at so we wander about a bit, and by chance stumble across our plane at what turns out to be our gate.
We take some seats in the café opposite, and Louise “lets me” buy her a beer. It was £3, flat, warm and disgusting. People queued to get on for ages, and we joined them at 1.15, already resigned to not leaving at the intended 1.30 as the organisation of the queue and boarding was a farce. There were about three queues. Two of which going nowhere, and the one we finally found that worked had some muppet at the head of it with a “problem” of some sort.
He could not possibly have known my level of hatred for him at that point….what??? No I am not over reacting!!
Finally we are seated on row 28. Louise and the girls have the window seat and the two adjacent and I am on the aisle of the block of four in the middle. I am sat next to a lady whose name turns out to be Jack….it was either Jumping Jack or Jack in the Box, because her backside made contact with her seat for about seven minutes of the whole flight.
As we are preparing to take off the cabin crew make an announcement, asking that nobody on board get their nuts out.
I am surprised they are holding such a grudge from last year, as it was an accident, and some people seemed quite please anyway….
It turns out, someone had a severe nut allergy, and if anyone so much as opened a back of dry roasted their head would explode…or something like that.
We take off at about 2pm.
The films were Shrek 3 and Spiderman 3…neither of which I watched due to having to get up out of my seat every seventeen seconds, plus I had seen Shrek and I don’t like the Spiderman films.
So for the next nine hours or so we flew.
The food was OK…some sort of chicken thing with mash and veg. The kids had kids meals which were meatballs and pasta. Emily will never eat anything other than sweets and Pringles on a plane, but Rebecca had a bash at it. The kids meal dessert was...a Mars Bar!! So I helped with that.
The flight really dragged, but I effortlessly completed the Visa Waiver forms despite Mrs Nudge McNudger next to me, and the kids asking me “are we there yet?” every ten minutes. I am such a pro.
We finally land at 5.45pm local time, and we’re off the plane pretty quickly. Immigration is fully staffed, but Emily is fully loaded and needs the loo desperately, having held it for the entire flight. She has a thing about plane toilets…she prefers patterned ones….No? Ok, never mind.
So Louise rushes her to the loo and Rebecca and I join the queue. They return just in time and we are through and stamped painlessly, and into baggage reclaim.
We have three cases, and two appear immediately. The third of course is being held back by the bloke behind the curtain whilst he and his mates have a good laugh. Finally it arrives after about ten minutes and we are away.
We just beat the main rush into Dollar (I always preferred Bucks Fizz to be honest), and I wait with Rebecca.
Now, I had ordered a two door economy, being fairly sure that these do not exist. Now as I wait to be seen, the question is can I hold my nerve and not go for the upgrade. I am summoned forward, and after a brief tussle over my own insurance policy, and the guy (Kevin) blatantly lying to me that it didn’t include stuff that was there in black and white on the policy in front of us both, I decided he could whistle for his upgrade and I was very firm, if you’ll pardon the expression.
He tells me the car we are getting is the size of a Corsa back home. Never having seen a car that small on an US road I don’t believe him. Furthermore we have been driven to Manchester airport in a Golf, with an extra body in it, so I think I’ll take my chances, Kev, old buddy, old mate.
So he gives in, takes just 40 or so dollars for the gas and lets me go. I am really keen at this point to see what we ended up with, having a mental picture of a 2 door Smart Car, so I encourage our party to Row A where the chariot awaits.
It is hot of course, very hot, and as I fight the urge to sprint to the car, as Louise is pushing the trolley of cases, I am held back by Louise “needing” to get a drink from the vending machine, right now, this minute, it will not wait.
So I have to delve around in Ryan to find some US money, and then some change that fits the machine, and then…well quite frankly it was all just taking too long. Finally we have the holy grail that is a bottle of diet coke, and we race right to the bottom of the row A.
Continued.....
