/travel/ireland/Flight
LHR to YYZ, seat 38G on an Airbus 340, VGML. DUB to LHR this morning. Heathrow announced gates only just before they were to start boarding, and apparently this flight is carrying two flights worth of people, so we got off a little late. Windspeeds are in our favour, the cap says.
Air Canada seems to be better-run than the last time I flew with them -- perhaps last Christmas? The very first time I flew, it was to move to Saskatoon, paid for by Rio Algom. It was first class, and they handed us hot towels with tongs. This seems to have moved back to economy class, though they're more J-cloths now than proper towels. A nice touch. The desert is served separately -- two Quaker chocolate chip cookies -- one imagines this may be due to low desert-consummption rates. Now, with those cost-savings, they can afford those hot J-cloths.
It's about the half-way mark. The movie is over, people have returned to their magazines, books, and blog postings. Well, okay, I don't see anybody else writing a blog entry. They showed Finding Neverland. It was good..the kind of film both myself and my parents would enjoy.
I'm headed to Toronto, for my mom's 60th birthday party weekend. She doesn't know I'm coming, which is why I haven't mentioned this trip much. Then on Sunday I fly to San Francisco, for five more weeks of training.
I've caught a few taxis lately, trying to squeeze things in here and there. I stlil don't have a "low-end" bike that I'm comfortable leaving locked outside banks and grocery stores, so it's foot or taxi. One was of the species Imigratus Integratus Maximus, a rare find in Dublin. Another remarked that the reason for Dublin's bad urban design is that it didn't get bombed recently, and what they needed was another war. It was amusing, if a bit absurd. The problem with Dublin's urban design is that too many people want cars, houses in the country, and jobs in the city.
Yesterday I went and visited Clare's college. The taxi driver (Species: Incomprehensibilus Accentus) dropped me at the wrong end of campus, so I also got to walk through the campus. It felt like a University, which feels a bit like going back to visit one's High School.
They seem to be showing the movie again. Weird.
The couple in front of me are sleeping on each other's shoulders. It's cute.
It's nice to hear Canadian accents. My accent-detector is definitely getting better with travel, though I still have a hard time with the Irish ones.
At Heathrow, as far as I could tell, everyone picking up a connecting flight gets re-security-checked. I'll have to pay more attention when I go back through -- it could have been just because I switched terminals. They didn't like my carry-on bag, and suspected something of being a throwing-star. It got a good swabbing, but the security guard was friendly. It bugs me when they think they have to be surly to do their job.
I bought a copy of The Economist. The lazy beside me (with a British accent, but from the Canadian version of Hastings) has The National Enquirer. Little bumps now. I predict the seatbelt sign will go on any second.
My veggie meal was couscous and a sort of over-cooked ratatouille. Relatively tasty, though it seemed smaller than usual.
I'm looking forward to seeing my family...sounds like it's going to be a pretty good gathering.
Oooh! They're playing another movie..apparently re-showing Finding Neverland was a mistake. That's all from me, then.
(No more turbulence, and no seatbelt sign. Guess my atmospheric-spidey-senses are miscalibrated.)
