Transatlantic Travels

So I’m back in NYC and getting back into the swing of work after a brief and packed last minute trip to London for some client run training. The trip went well despite the fact that I didn't receive confirmation that I'd actually be going until Wednesday morning of last week, the very same Wednesday I was supposed to be catching an overnight flight to London. I had to pack my bag, bring it to the office and hope for the best.

Anyway of course I did go and fortunately I was lucky enough to get a standby spot in business class. I've only flown business class once before and oooooh it was so nice. I'm not sure I can go back to economy. When I get on my Cathay Pacific flight to Hong Kong in a couple of months there could well be a kerfuffle with the flight attendants as I attempt to turn left into business instead of right into coach. The seats recline into beds people!!! Beds!!! Not that having a bed helped on the sleep thing, but still...beds!!! S’marvellous. I was chuffed to bits. Of course I didn't give away my excitement to my fellow business class travellers, but instead gave an impressive display of feigned nonchalance prior to take off when all the privacy screens were down, my demeanour clearly proclaiming "I travel business class all the time don't you know." Admittedly I may have given myself away by involuntarily emitting a squeak of excitement once the privacy screens were up and I was free to play around with my seat controls. Whoo hoo!!!

Checking in for the return flight on standby the nice woman at the assistance desk apologised because there weren’t any seats available upstairs.

Upstairs????

Isn’t that first class?

Phew, can you imagine? I think it’s just as well there were no seats available; my heart wouldn’t have been able to stand the extreme levels of excitement had I been given a seat upstairs. Even just the thought of flying first class gives me palpitations. Besides, it wouldn’t exactly been in the style of a trans-atlantic jetsetter to have sauntered into First class clutching a carrier bag from Boots would it. True, jetsetters do need toothpaste and deodorant, but they probably have some minion buy it for them eh. For the record I had to stock up on my spray deodorant – you can only get roll-ons in NYC. They don’t sell coloured loo paper over here either - and stand up pump action toothpaste. You can get bubble gum flavour stand up toothpaste for kids, but I don't think I would like that flavour as much as whitening fresh mint you can buy everywhere in England. These things matter when your bathroom is the size of a shoebox. I don't need lazy lying down toothpaste cluttering up the place. No sireeee!!

Anyway the biz travel was generally good and since it was a bank holiday for Labor Day in the US I got to stay the weekend, catch up with Miles and B and visit my family in Yorkshire. Good ol’ England was reliably overcast as usual, but everyone kept telling me how warm it was as I crunched through fallen leaves and clutched my lightweight raincoat around myself to keep out the chill, although to be honest I'm bursting for a bit of autumnal weather to arrive in New York. It's frigging 88F here and humid as hell. The only bit I wasn't so keen on the part where I got off the overnight flight, freshened up in the ladies loos - although quite frankly it was a lipstick on a pig situation since no amount of make-up was going to make me look good after minimal sleep and no bathing beyond a rub down with a wet wipe and a squirt of deodorant, consumed a very large coffee – Costa Coffee are beating the Americans at their own supersizing game with their humungous cappuccino that arrives in a cup with 2 handles. TWO!!! I was anticipating a European version of large not something I needed two hands to pick up – and went straight to my training course. I was dosed up on coffee for much of the day, but was still swaying with jet lag come the afternoon UK time when I would find myself having moments of staring vacantly at the instructor. However at least I had an excuse unlike some of the London based folk who I noted were also having trouble keeping their eyes open beyond 3pm, although to be fair there's a limit to how much SQL you can take in one day.