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

My ticket is booked and I'm coming home for a couple of weeks.
I'm in a strange position that I'm living in Sydney most of the time and my return ticket finishes in the UK - so I have the problem of do I buy a single when I come back to Sydney and then buy return airline tickets from this end.

I go home with Etihad via the middle east but come back with Cathay Pacific via Hong Kong - any tips from seasoned travellers?

Is that the airline which was still making stopovers in Baghdad during the Iraq War?

I hear Kabul's very pleasant this time of year.

I have friends who have just come back after going to Afghanistan. One of them was one of the human shields in Iraq just as the war was starting. She got shot at when she was in Iraq... by the Americans.

I've never travelled any farther than to Turkey, so I can't give you advice here. What is the cheapest option?

I'm not much of a traveller but

Thanks for the support Loonycat. I've been to several places and like travelling. There is nearly always a cheaper option Bel but at some point you have to bite the bullet and buy. You can get to the point when the fares go up as you get closer to your travelling date and the cheaper ones are snapped up - but I never claim to be able to guarantee I have the cheapest fare anywhere. So long as someone else is paying more than me I am happy!

Hmm, well, it doesn't sound like you'll be stopping over in my part of the Middle East (which is really quite small, so very easy to miss, especially when flying over), but if you do get here, drop me a note, eh?

I think it's Abu Dhabi but I'll only be there for a short time (long enough to put fuel in the aeroplane, but hopefully not long enough for me to be tempted to buy anything in the airport shops) and then leaping on the next flight out. How are you Lady P?

I'm quite well, thank you. Very glad to hear the news about h2g2. I even bought a Gargleblaster shirt!

A gargleblaster shirt!?

Indeed! And you can get one too - and even help the Community Consortium by doing so.

http://www.zazzle.com.au/gargleblaster_tshirt-235856031052483754
(I even found it on the Aussie version of the site for ya. )

In the time that passed since I last posted here, I already got the shirt in the mail, actually, so that's cool. And I tried to make a virgin gargleblaster (I don't like alcohol), which tasted surprisingly good, considering it was basically a mixture of Very Weird Stuff That Should Not Go Together. I'm not sure if I was just lucky to have accidentally figured out a good concoction, or if my tastebuds are ruined...

Thanks for that Lady P. I'm not much of a drinker myself so if you have the recipe for the virgin one I'd much appreciate it.
On another note I would give Etihad higher marks that Cathay Pacific for the travel experience. Some of the Cathay Pacific staff were decidedly offhand with the passengers. Which I was surprised by.

Kinda forgot this thread. Sorry to have kept you waiting for that recipe, I guess?

...However, I think calling it a 'recipe' would be a bit pretentious. It was seriously meant to be just a concoction of weird stuff - kinda like when you'r a kid and you try to mix all sorts of strange stuff, either out of morbid curiosity or to try and dare a sibling/friend to drink it, you know? Mostly, it was supposed to be weird&crazy, and to look interesting in a photo.
So I took a tall glass, and put some chocolate syrup in it (mine's homemade, but I don't think that made much of a difference). And a few drops of lemon juice, as a homage to the 'brain crushed by a slice of lemon wrapped around a gold brick' description. And a few drops of Tabasco, because, well, weird&crazy, right? Then I poured in some pink grapefruit juice, mainly because of the colour, and filled the rest with carbonated water, just because I thought it should have some fizz. Then I took the photo, and tried taking a sip. It mainly tasted like grapefruit juice, a little diluted, a little fizzy, and a little spicy (because of the Tabasco). So I thought to myself, okay, that's not too bad, but the chocolate syrup is at the bottom; it probably _will_ be bad if I mix it. So I tried mixing it, and it still wasn't too bad. An okay sort of combination of sweet and bitter and fizzy with a little sting of hot pepper. Surprisingly good for what it was (the key word here being 'surprising'), but still not something I'd recommend on its own.

Maybe they should do a Gargleblaster recipe competition, for the new site. See what weird stuff people come up with (and how good/bad it ends up tasting).

This reminds me of the 4 Jacks drinking game. You take a pack of cards and a group of 4 or more bored people who have nothing better to do in a pub. Deal the cards one at a time to the players face up on the table. When someone gets a Jack they name a drink (probably alcoholic, but it doesn't have to be). The second Jack gets to name the mixer - any other drink. The third Jack has to pay for it and the fourth Jack has to drink it. Combinations like Guinness and Tomato Juice have been known.

I may start a thread on the perfect gargle blaster...