Lagging
I don't care what time it says on this posting, as far as I'm concerned it's just after 5pm, since I'm now eight timezones from home, having spent nearly 11 hours on a plane today.
Not a bad flight all told - online check-in last night actually worked, traffic to the airport was absolutely nightmarish, so it's just as well I had checked-in from home, got an aisle seat and there was a spare seat between me and the man by the window, so I liked that, everything was more or less on time, and Virgin's new (to me, at any rate) in-flight entertainment system is absolutely cracking. It's *all* on-demand, so you can choose to start watching or listening to anything in the system whenever you want, you can pause, remind, fast forward, and best of all, set up a playlist drawn from all the different channels and just work you way through it.
Once again, I'm impressed by the thought and effort that Virgin put into their service offerings. I think the food's slipped a little though.
Downside to this little jaunt, apart from some jetlag that will probably hit after I get home at the weekend, is that tonight is going to be my first night without David since he was away for a friend's wedding at the end of August. *Not* looking forward to that at all.
Bush vs Marriage
It's odd that President Bush is so apparently for the Constitutional Amendment that would 'protect' marriage, when the forces under his command seem so determined to wipe out people who actually do get married.
At least, that's the way it'll look if they keep on blowing up wedding parties all the time.
You Heard It Here First
My beloved colleagues are in the process of spreading the word to such channels as might want to make hay with it and spread it wider (NTK, The Register, etc), but this is something that I found first.
The UK HM Customs and Excise website doesn't work in any browser but Internet Explorer, at least none that we have available here, which includes Netscape, Firefox and Opera, tested as far as possible on PCs and Macs.
Don't believe me? One screenshot, captured about two minutes ago.
EDIT - Looks like they've sorted out the problem. Oh well, it was funny while it lasted. Or have they? Wow, that's one out of control site.
Remember ‘The Born-Again Busted Fan’?
Well he's having doubts about them now that Radio Four has mentioned that they apparently came out as 'unashamed Tories' yesterday.
What on earth is that all about??????
Back
Yes, we did return (reluctantly) from Barcelona, and yes, there are photos, but I just haven't got round to doing anything with them yet. Since I got back, I've been trying to get my head round doing various stuff at home, and also trying to energise myself to get a bunch of other things I've been talking about for too long sorted - like joining a gym for instance.
In the middle of that, David suddenly exchanged contracts and completed on his flat purchase in the space of a couple of hours, after weeks of uncertainty and confusion caused by the nightmarish vendor; the woman who shut the door in my face when we went to see the flat because she was only willing to let David in alone, and who it transpires was so apparently weird about keeping her environment hermetically pristine that she had the windows painted shut and sellotape over the inside faces of her keyholes. She's the kind of vendor who took the lightbulbs with her too.
And so, as an additional demonstration of how devoted to the man I must be, last night we went to Ikea (now open 'til midnight during the week! WTF????) - my first trip to one since I finally snapped and said "no more" after they'd fucked me off once too often with that "we deliberately give you crap service to save you money" attitude of theirs.
Barcelona Bound
Right, that's it - we're off. Passports packed, tickets not required, and a row to be had at the airport because we used the useful online check-in facility to save time, and we've ended you in separate rows, with no way to change the preallocation.
Ho hum.
Back on Sunday evening with photos.