h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Yes.. this is a day late, why do you ask? PC spent most of the day ( and night) yesterday in the room in meetings via phone and internet. It is already after noon on day two but I'll post that after tonight's quaff-fest with Light - if we're sober.

The trip over the pond -

On the up side, we flew nonstop from Charlotte, NC to London. On the down side is of course the airline food, airline seats, and general airline-ness involved.

We arrived about an hour late, then spent another two hours in the queue awaiting the passport check, which was a non-event once we got there. I'm guessing the UK has no problems with migrations as long as they are properly documented. We then spent another almost two hours in transit thanks to the lovely traffic on the M25. We were originally going to take a train, but M$ suggested to PC it would be no problem to arrange a car and driver.

By the time we got checked in and everything was set at the hotel we decided to make our way out for lunch and after a few y looks from PC (he's a very finicky eater) we ended up eating some of the worst Chinese food I've ever had in my life.

We got back to the hotel and PC immediately got online and on phone for meetings. He decided after the long trip he wasn't up to going to the Reading campus. While he did that I ed, as I'm seldom able to on airplanes. No doubt my snores punctuated his teleconference on a new release quite nicely.

If I hadn't been so whomped I would have gone out to find a nice shop to pick up a few things to keep in the room. Since I didn't we had no idea where to go after he finished his meetings and woke me up.

He told me to 'get ready to go out', meaning please put on some in' makeup and do something with that wild mass of red stuff. Though I did get a haircut before leaving home and they took off WAY more than I would have liked so there was maybe half as much red stuff as there is usually.

I told him "I'm ready, let's go" and he looked at me and very seriously said "We can always get room service" ( and not in a flattering or remotely worthy manner). So needless to say I grumbled my way into the bathroom to slap on a fresh coat of paint then appropriated his power converter for my curling iron to tame the rabid Irish setter sitting on my head.

We found our way to a place called The Oracle, a sort of shopping center on a waterway. Why the desk clerk thought we’d find some traditional English fare there I have no idea. After wandering for a bit we settled on a Portuguese restaurant that serves grilled chicken, chicken sammiches, and chicken wings. All with a choice of heat levels on the piri piri sauce.

Now for those of you who haven’t seen a photo of PC he is African American. I’m of course so white I glow in the dark. So at the counter where we ordered when he asked for the “hot” (the choice was mild, medium, hot and extra-hot) the man asked if he was sure that would be hot enough. When I asked for the same he asked just the opposite and looked at me like he couldn’t wait to see me dash out and jump in the waterway after tasting the chicken. PC just laughed and refrained from telling the man that my hair was so red from spicy food, not dye.

What he didn’t know is I like things a lot spicier than PC does. When we went to his family’s home over the holidays last year and his father warned me off the hotsauce PC said I practically swam in the stuff and he shouldn’t worry. Needless to say PC thought the hot was quite spicy enough thank you, while I wondered if I shouldn’t have gotten the extra-hot and went ahead and slathered on some extra piri piri sauce, plus dipped my chips in the same sauce, lest they diminish the heat from the chicken.

After dinner we walked for a bit more, then stopped for an ice cream, which we ate on the way back to the hotel. This was probably a bad idea as we were both completely stuffed afterward.

PC got back on the phone and internet, and I changed into my jammies. Then he decided to nap for a bit before another meeting, which I took as clear indication it was time for me to hurry up and check my email and check my conversations on hootoo. Not to mention get the logistics straight with Light for our meeting and quaffing tonight.

I woke him up for his meeting, and he kept asking for just another 10 minutes (over an hours worth), pulling me into bed to snuggle and making it very difficult for me to stay awake in order to make sure he woke up. When he finally did get up for his meeting, I took an Ambien to make sure I’d sleep then curled up for the night. I don’t know when he finally made it to bed (one of the nicer qualities of Ambien) but about an hour before our wake up call was to go off he said he hadn’t been able to sleep and been watching TV all night. I told him he should have woken me as I always know how to make him sleep.

Now before you go getting all dirty and stuff what I meant is when I rub his back and shoulders he can fall asleep within minutes though there are other ways to make him sleep (but not when I’m on sleeping meds). I rubbed his back and shoulders, and true to form he was ing within minutes.

...And here I was, expecting to hear all kinds of horror stories about how difficult it was to get through security before boarding your flight.

[Amy+ was "tagged" for scanning before she left here a couple weeks ago - her luggage was scanned (and possibly searched - I mean she had *everything* we could possibly fit in those 3 suitcases that she might need for a year at Uni over there, and since she'll need to do all her own cooking, there were some rather odd items stuck in some rather odd places in her luggage), and when she went through security, she was pulled aside for a full body scan with the hand held wand, plus a complete pat down. At least they stopped short of a complete body cavity search.]

Sounds like an interesting trip so far.

*giggles* PC travels so frequently that we have special VIP security check areas we go to in the Charlotte airport. So though they were rather thorough, there wasn't a wait for the pleasure. No doubt that won't be the case on the return. I just saw a news story on the security lines at Gatwick.

I had also decided to leave many of the toiletries behind and just stop by a shop here to replace some of them. My mom and I got into that habit whenever we'd travel just to avoid shampoos exploding in our luggage so it was no real difference to not bring it this time.

*reads and s before -break expires .....*

I tend to be on the spicy-hot side of the aisle myself when eating in restaurants. I've only ever eaten in one Indian restaurant where the food was too hot for me (but I ate it anyway )

*giggles* I've done that... not sure if it's determination or some insane pride in being able to eat it anyway..

I don't know if it was pride on my part, but the insanity part is dead on target. I kept asking for more and more water...