Saturday

Saturday was a fairly eventful day.

On Friday night the pesky cat had got up on the roof of the house, and he was still there on Saturday. He was looking a bit freaked out and scared to come down, meowing and pacing up and down a lot.
Viv and I decided to go out into the front garden, in hopes of coaxing him back down the treee he used to get up there in the first place. I'm standing on the drive when Viv decides to go to the bottom of the tree to try and talk him down.
She walks into the grassy area in flip flops and suddenly ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE!
Poor Viv - she stepped on a bee and got stung right on the sole of her foot. She freaked out!

Bless her, I remember how much it hurts when you get stung, though thankfully I haven't experienced it for a long time. I also remember how frightening it is when you're a kid. So she's screaming and crying and I'm feeling slightly panicky. So I scooped her up and carried her back to the house. Vinny came to the rescue and pulled the sting out of her foot. She was so brave. We ran her foot under cold water for a few minutes, then I liberally applied lots of After Bite. I was so glad I thought to take that with me. It works so well. Pretty soon she had regained her composure and we managed to get a little smile out of her. Brave kid.


Another, much more relaxed and fun part of Saturday was watching hummingbirds drink nectar from the feeder right outside the window. It was absolutely awe-inspiring. They are so beautiful and tiny. I felt really privileged to be able to stand not 3 feet away from them and watch them hover and stick those long tongues into the feeder to get nectar. Fantastic.
Here's a link to my hummingbird (and other California wildlife) video I made. So cool.

The main event on Saturday was something I have waited YEARS to experience. We went to watch Vinny play ice hockey with the San Diego Bruins team. It was as much fun as I guessed it'd be and WAY MORE.

Go Vinny, Go Vinny!!!!

I made video too.

They got thrashed by the other team, but who cares? It was great fun and it was nice and cool in there by the ice. Everyone else thought it was f-f-f-freezing. We thought it was just nice....

It's a very fast moving sport and I'll admit I had no idea what was going on for most of the game, but it was very enjoyable. In fact, it's inspired Mark and I to maybe start going to check out some of the games of our local ice hockey team, the MK Lightnings.

At least the Bruins had a few supporters there. Me, Mark, Jodi, Viv, Vern and Cassidy were rooting for them. The other team only had one supporter. She was sitting a few feet away from us and kept quiet until we started making a little noise. Then she got quite vocal in her support. Good for her I say.

Cassidy came back with us to the house after the game and I made portobello mushroom risotto for everyone for dinner. They seemed to really enjoy it. It's a very simple, but very tasty recipe.

For 6-ish people

Brown rice (about 1/2 cup per person)
2 packs of Portobello mushrooms quite finely chopped (it's worth using the real McCoy as they taste great)
1/2 an onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 vegetable stock cube
Mustard seeds (just a few sprinkled in)
Assorted herbs - whatever takes your fancy really. Just go easy so you don't over-power the taste of the mushrooms. I think I used rosemary, coriander, thyme - stuff like that.

Fry the onion, garlic and mushrooms for a few minutes.
Crumble in the stock cube and add the rice and herbs and stir it all together.
Add enough water to cover the rice.
Bring to the boil and simmer until the rice is cooked, adding more water as needed.

Simple!

Friday - San Diego

Well - El Cajon to be precise....

Friday was a very chilled out day. It was dang hot and we spent a lot of the day just hanging in the garden with Vinny, Casey the super affectionate dog and the crazy cat. Jodi had to go to work, during the day.

Vinny and Mark practice their loafing skills. Experts at work...

Casey

Bonkers cat! Affectionate one minute, biting your ankles the next.

We were just enjoying the weather and watching birds and butterflies buzzing around the garden.

Swallowtail?

We did leave the house, to go grocery shopping with Vinny. I actually really enjoy going to supermarkets in the US. It's a very different experience to here, so it has novelty value (much like the cucumber lady in Sainsburys - in joke...) Everything is BIG in America. Supermarkets, the shopping carts, portion sizes, THE BILL! It's surpising really. Eating out is so cheap over there in comparison to here, but actually buying food is pretty expensive. We went to a couple of places and tried to resist the temptation to buy LOADS of stuff.

Then we went with Vinny to pick Viv up from school and she hung out with us in the afternoon too.

Viv

Lunch was American style sandwiches (which I am now obsessed with since we came home). They KNOW how to make a sandwich! It has to have AT LEAST 6 ingredients.

None of your boring cheese & pickle - oh no..... For example, my sandwich today was mayonnaise, quorn ham, grated cheese, cucumber, lettuce and home-made salsa - and it was bloody lovely.

But I digress (again).

Vern stayed over at her friend Cassidy’s house on Friday night, so we didn't see her much. She's a Varsity cheerleader and they had a game. She looked awesome in her outfit.

It was still so hot on Friday evening that we decided to not go to the Brendan Benson gig in San Diego. Besides - we wanted to spend as much time as possible with our friends, and a gig isn't the best place to make conversation.

Vinny made his world famous tacos for dinner, which were YUMMERS, then I settled down to watch a film with Jodi, while the boys watched a baseball game. Jodi and I watched 300, which is a fantastic film about the Spartan army. It was cool.

Sleep. ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Thursday

Woke up in agony! My calf muscles were like lumps of rock and I could hardly walk. Yikes!
I popped some pain killers and lay face down in the middle of the living room with Mark using a rolling pin to massage my legs.

Thursday was also Alex’s first day at kindergarten. Everyone was excited and upset in equeal amounts. He seemed to enjoy himself anyway.

We didn't really do anything on Thursday, apart from pack and enjoy what was left of our time with Andy and Gabi. We'd already aquired quite a lot of extra stuff, so Andy kindly gave us a spare suitcase he had lying around. All too soon it was time for Andy to take us to the airport and officially handed us off to Vinny on the phone. We said our goodbyes, many hugs were exchanged and I managed not to cry - just.

When I put my carry-on bag through the x-ray machine, the lady called me over.
"Is this your bag ma'am?"
"Ummm, yes..."
"I'm just going to take a look inside here."
"OK" (even though I knew I'd done nothing wrong and had nothing I shouldn't, it still made me nervous.

She pulls out the large bag of corn bread mix powder, that Michelle had given me, from my bag, shows it to the x-ray operator and they both smile. Phew.... I guess it hadn't occured to me just how much that looked like a kilo of cocaine on the x-ray!

The flight to San Diego takes just over 2 hours and passes some pretty amazing scenery. As you leave Seattle you get a spectacular view of Mount Ranier. It towers over everything else in the landscape, an incredible sight. I looked out of the window over Portland and waved to Jacob and Sarah. I wonder if they had a strange feeling around 4pm that someone was watching them?
I also waved hello to Oregon for my boss Devra.

Next up was Mount St Helens, with its massive chunk missing from the top and one side, from the eruption in 1980 (?), then Mount Hood and the Three Sisters. It’s a beautiful mountain range.
The pilot was great and pointed out anything of interest as we flew over it.

We saw Lake Tahoe, which is HUGE. It took several minutes to fly over it. Then the landscape started to gradually change from green to brown as we headed South and into California. There were massive tracts of land laid out in perfect squares and loads of circles of green, where you can see the shape the rotating irrigation sprinklers make. It’s frightening to think of the amount of water that’s being used to grow these crops out in what is basically a desert. And it all has to be pumped in. Best not to think about it really, I guess.

Arrived in San Diego and it was HOT. It was SO good to see Vinny's smiling face waiting for us at the airport.
We got yummy Round Table pizza for dinner on the way back to chez Votel. Jodi, Veronica and Vivienne were all there, waiting at the door to meet us. There was lots of running around, hugging, saying "Look at you!" to the kids (we haven't seen them for 2 1/2 years) etc etc.
Thursday night involved much chilling out, catching up and relaxing into the Californian pace of life. Aaaaaahhhhhh.

People are strange

A slight aside from my holiday blog, which I am still working on and will add more here later.
Our next door neighbours are having a bit fight right now. I can hear them shouting and slamming things around through the wall. Their baby is also being exposed to this aggressive behaviour, which can't be good.

I've never understood why people who love each other scream and shout, and say such horrible things to each other. I'm of the opinion that the rest of the world out there sucks so much and is so selfish and unkind, that the ONE place you should be at peace is at home with the one you love.

• It's each person's responsibility to not make the world a worse place for those they care about.
• You should be the smile, the hug, the kind word at the end of a crappy day.
• You should be the haven of love to come home to. That counts for both people in a relationship.
• Agree to disagree.
• Don't try to change each other, because you may just find that you lose the person you fell in love with if you do.
• Don't get annoyed at each other's little faults, find them amusing.
• Embrace the phrase "But when I do it, it's cute!"

There's enough shit out there. Don't make your home life just part of the daily shit. 

Wednesday

On Wednesday we went for our first ever bona fide HIKE. We've been for walks before, but when in the USA, you call it a hike - so ner.
We drove out to Twin Falls State Park, which is close to North Bend and Snoqualmie. Twin Peaks country.

It's an absolutely stunning area, especially to us East Anglians. We're just not used to hills, never mind mountains. Bear in mind that I'm still impressed every time we go to Manchester via the Woodhead Pass. Our part of the country is as flat as a flat thing that's feeling a bit let down. So - I digress.....

The Twin Falls hike is a beautiful lush green forest walk that takes you along the side of the river for the first 1/2 mile or so. The river itself reminded me a little of parts of Wales. Crystal clear water bubbling over boulders and stones.

It looked so inviting, we were all tempted to dip our toes in, but we moved on. The air is so clean there. The trees are dripping with mosses and ferns. I've never seen so many different types of slugs either!

The path gradually moves away from the riverside and starts to head uphill and becomes more uneven in places as you go. A quite gruelling mile of uphill hiking (stumbling) that got steeper and steeper as we went, was a killer for my poor legs, which started to feel a bit wobbly by the time we reached the waterfalls. But oh my, was it worth it! Stepping out onto the bridge across the small gorge was exhilirating. Mark was very brave, seeing as he's not keen on heights. Beautiful views and the sound of the falls - it was magical. You can feel the extra oxygen in the air around fast moving water.

Thinking the path was a circular route, and we'd end up back where we started, we kept on. Onwards and UPWARDS. It got steeper and steeper, the path cutting switch-backs into the mountain side. It was a real struggle. We kept going and going. I ran out of water and started to wish I'd brought more than a small 1/2 litre bottle with me. We came to a particularly steep bit after about another 1/2 mile and I just stopped dead. I couldn't go any further. I was so thirsty and my legs were like jelly.

We saw some people coming back down the path, who had passed us earlier. They told us it wasn't a circular path. When you get to the top, which  was another 1/2 mile UP, you had to go back the way you came. Disappointingly, they also said there's no pay-off when you reach the top. No spectacular view, no hidden gem - it just fizzles out and there's a railway track. Apparently the walk up as far as the falls is the intended as the main pretty hike. The rest is for serious exercise and veteran hikers. Ha! Neither of those apply to me....

Andy and Gabi were determined to not be beaten by the hill. They wanted to get to the top. So they convinced me to go on. It felt like a LONG way, and I tried my best. I got to probably within 1/4 mile of the end, but I just couldn't physically go ANY FURTHER. I thought I was going to puke or cry or collapse. I was right on the edge of what I could take - physically. So I let them go on ahead and rested while we waited for them to come back down. I would have liked to get to the top, but I just couldn't do it. The views from as far as we got were still pretty amazing, to these eyes.

We still had the long walk back down to contend with. Down hill hurts in a whole new set of places!
Of course, while I was huffing and puffing and complaining about how much it hurt and where, Andy and Gabi's 5 year old son, Alex just ran up the mountain and back down again, like it was nothing. And he STILL had energy to spare. Oh for just a percentage of his energy.....

It sounds like I'm complaining and didn't enjoy this hike at all doesn't it? That's just not the case. Yes - there were moments when I longed for a cold drink, a hot shower and a comfy bed, BUT it was all totally worth it. The beautiful forest, the stunning waterfall, the lovely friends all made it an experience I'll never forget.

Funnily enough, I don't really remember much more about Wednesday. I remember stopping at a 'gas station' to buy junk food and huge drinks, which we all got down our necks as fast as possible. After that I think we just collapsed in a heap and a deep sleep. The sleep of the over-exercised.

Tuesday

On Tuesday we went to the Seattle aquarium with Andy, Gabi and Alex, which was fantastic. So many really cool fish (and not a chip in sight). We saw river otters, sea otters, sea lions, seals, puffins, loads of starfish, jellyfish, seahorses etc etc. It was fascinating and great fun. I took a bunch of pictures which are all on my Flickr page.

After the aquarium we chilled out on the pier for a while, enjoying the sunshine and the gorgeous views of the bay.

Next up was a little shopping at North Bend. I bought some snazzy Converse and Mark bought 2 pairs of Skechers. I love going to North Bend - it's where Twin Peaks was filmed and it's absolutely stunning there.
On the way there we got some great views of Mount Ranier, which towers over all the other mountains in the area.

A delicious dinner at a Mexican restaurant rounded off the day nicely. I ate far too much and actually made myself feel a bit sick. Had to go outside for some fresh air.

A nice relaxed evening of chatting finished us off for the night.

Monday

Monday was just like being at home. It was pissing down with rain. We checked out of the hotel and Andy very kindly came up picked up our luggage and took it to his house. This worked out well, as we could go off and enjoy our day without worrying about all the suitcases. We were staying with Andy and Gabi from Monday night for the rest of our stay.


So we hopped on the monorail, which is great fun and headed down to the Seattle Center, right next to the Space Needle to meet up with Jon, Michelle and Darian for the Bumbershoot Festival. Bumbershoot has been happening for years, but this was the first time we’d had an opportunity to check it out. It’s a 3 day festival that takes place right in the middle of the city. They fence off a large area and use all the buildings inside as venues.

We caught about 10 minutes of The Minus Five, then went over and saw a bit of a band called Say Hi. They were really good. There was another band that we snuck in to see, but I can’t remember their name. They were playing on the stage inside the Space Needle.

The Minus Five

We spent some time playing all the silly fairground games, throwing darts, shooting ping-pong balls etc. Mark won me a purple monkey! He’s never won me anything at a fair before – ever. Jon won a blow-up alien and Michelle even managed to get a cuddly duck out of one of those grabber machines, that NO-ONE ever wins anything out of.

One of the moments when it stopped raining temporarily.

We decided to grab something to eat before Jon’s show, and so began the day of sugar overload. Fries and a massive 3 berry burst smoothie from Orange Julius, followed by some extra sickly fudge and a huge cotton candy (candy floss). I was buzzing!

Time to head over to the venue for the main event of the day The Radio 8 Ball Show. It’s an interesting concept. Everyone on the audience is given a card and a pencil. On the card you write a question that you’d like answered. It can be anything from something silly to something profound. The cards are then collected and one is picked at random. If they pick your card, you have to go up onstage and ready your question out. You then flip a coin which decides whether you pick a card or spin the wheel. There is a list of 8 songs on a board on the stage. The house band (Jon plus a bass player and drummer) play the song that corresponds to the number that you either picked out or the wheel stops on. The idea is that you listen to the song, then try to interpret how the song answers your question. With me so far?

Ask a question

Get a musical answer.

There were a couple of amusing ones, like the man who wants to kill all the mountain goats and his question was should we shoot them or trap them. Random….. The song he picked was called Blood & Roses. The chorus went “I want to live, but I don’t belong.” Pretty funny, considering his question.

The best one by far though was a woman who has a loser boyfriend who is out of work, owes her money and her mum thinks she should dump. She wanted to know what to do. So she spun the wheel and the song that came up was Jon’s track Six Feet Under. The very first line of that song is “Nothing’s going to save us now.” It’s a song about a relationship break-up. The whole place just erupted with laughter. Jon couldn’t sing, he was laughing so much. Not much interpreting needed there then. She said “I thin I know what I have to do.”

After the show, Michelle and Darian headed home and Mark, Jon and I went off to catch some of Dead Confederate’s set. We’d seen this band in the UK, supporting Dinosaur Jnr a few weeks earlier and liked them, so were looking forward to seeing them again. We eventually found the venue, but there was a HUGE queue to get in and they had already started their set, so we gave up and caught a cab back to Jon’s instead.

As if we hadn’t eaten enough sugar for one day, a quick visit to Cupcake Royale could not be missed. What an awesome place. They sell cupcakes, lots of cupcakes – and coffee. I got a fabulous classic cupcake with a massive pile of chocolate frosting on top. Mark had a carrot cupcake. They were bloody lovely.

Andy picked us up and we headed out to his lovely house in Lakeland Hills, near Auburn, where we were introduced to Edgar the guinea pig and settled in for the evening. A light dinner and off to sleep in their oooh-so-comfy guest bed. Aaaahhh......

Sunday

We had some free time on Sunday morning, so we went for a wander around the downtown shopping area. I managed to get some USA voltage hair straighteners for a bargain $30. I needed them to help me cope with the humidity. I go seriously curly without them. Went into Macy’s, unimpressed, walked out again.


Sunday afternoon Jon picked us up and we went to Trading Musician, which is a fantastic music shop. They sell mostly 2nd hand stuff and they have a great policy where anyone is free to grab a lead, switch on any amp they fancy and have a go with any of the instruments. You don’t have to ask to try things out, you just help yourself. A lot of (most) UK music shops could learn a lot about how to treat potential customers from these guys. Mark tried out a guitar, but didn’t buy it. I fell in love with, and very nearly bought a kalimba (thumb harp). They were so beautifully made and sounded gorgeous. But I wasn’t sure if it would fit in my luggage, so I had to resist.

When they found out we were friends of Jon’s the guys in the shop very kindly gave Mark and I a free t-shirt each, which was cool, as I was thinking about buying one. Their philosophy is that it’s cool for their shop to get advertised around the world, and we were happy to oblige.

Next up was a trip to Jon’s favourite wine store. It’s a huge warehouse absolutely full of every type of wine you can imagine from all over the world. I bought a $30 bottle of local Washington red, which we had with dinner that night. And very nice it was too.

Finally, we went to Bedrock Industries, a place I’d found on the internet some time last year and had wanted to go to since I found it. It’s a really cool place. You can take your household glass there and they pay you for it. Then they crush it, melt it down and make beautiful art from it. I wanted EVERYTHING there, from the coasters to the huge garden mobiles, but I limited myself to buying an adorable hand-made recycled glass robot. They had 50 or 60 on display, but I knew as soon as I saw him that this one was for me. I love the look on his face. Slightly startled, like he’s saying “What’s going on?”

Back to Jon and Michelle’s apartment for yummy homemade 3 bean chilli and corn bread. I’d never had corn bread before. I so tasty!
Desert was strawberry shortcake Why it’s called shortcake I have no idea. It was a tower of sponge cake, covered in crushed strawberries and whipped cream. There was nothing short on that cake, flavour or height! Amazing.

After dinner we watched watched Death Proof another Tarantino movie and finished off the tasty wine.
We were sent off at the end of the night with 2 packs of cornbread mix and some chilli seasoning.

Saturday

Woke up at 7am with a blinding migraine. Yikes! It felt like my head was splitting in two (don’t we know a song about that too?) I was dizzy and felt like I was going to puke. Not good. I took as many headache pills as I dared and sat very still for several hours. A yummy stack of pancakes as big as my face with warm syrup was consumed (purely for medical reasons, of course). Thankfully, it did eventually pass and by the time Andy, Gabi and Alex arrived at 1.30pm I’d had plenty of time to chill out and almost felt normal again (for me).

We had a fun couple of hours at a kids birthday party at ‘Pump It Up’. It was all quite civilised. None of the expected screaming and punching tantrums and what not (and that’s just the parents!) The kids, and some of the adults, bounced and slid around, then there was cake and ice cream and presents for the birthday boy. Not the nightmare situation I imagined. Quite fun.

Gabi, Alex, Mark and Andy on the inflatable throne.


Weeeeeeee.....

After the party they drove us back into Seattle to get us checked into our 3rd hotel in 3 days, the Crowne Plaza. Turns out we got a room on the priority club floor. 34th floor – top floor! It’s crazy high up here. You need your room key to get the lift to come up to this floor. No riff-raff allowed. We feel like imposters! Haha. It’s an ace room with fantastic views. One of the first things we saw (Mark spotted it) was two eagles having a mid-air punch-up and swooping around. Cool!
Massive thanks and kudos to Andy for getting this room for us. We REALLY do appreciate your endless generosity.


It's a LONG way down.

Stunning views.

The bed is enormous and very squishy – just how I like it.

Saturday evening Jon picked us up from the hotel and we went for a nice drive around (he used to drive us around – arf arf,). We headed up to Ballard to see the sun setting over the Olympic mountain range. It was absolutely beautiful, looking out across the water to the mountains on the horizon. Stunning.
We coveted some very nice houses, then went to Ballard Market, which is a huge supermarket crammed full of really good stuff. Lots of veggie and organic and locally grown stuff. I could have spent A LOT of money in there, but restricted myself to some chocolate bunnies and some cheese bunnies. The intention was to bring them home, but the cheese bunnies didn’t last very long at all. They’re lovely. Cheesy little biscuits in the shape of bunnies. Mmmmm.

Mark admires the stunning view.

Sunset over the Olympics.

Back to Chez Auer for a lovely home-cooked dinner of a delicious pasta bake with garlic bread, followed by yummy apple pie with loads of cinnamon and whipped cream. Oh man – soooooo good.
A great evening.

Seattle – Friday

Arrived at Seattle airport earlier than expected (don’t we know a song about that?) Jon picked us up from the airport and kindly deposited us at The Red Lion Hotel in Bellevue, our digs for the night.
Nice place – we had a first floor room with a balcony. It was clean and comfortable and had free wi-fi, exactly what you need. We saw a couple of what we assumed were blue jays bobbing around in the trees outside.
I have to say that hotel beds over here are so much more comfortable than those at home. They’re always really squishy and BIG. I never fail to sleep ok in a big squishy bed.

Andy called, and I convinced him to sneak out of work for an hour to come over and see us. Sssshhh, don’t tell anyone. Man – that boy is LOOKING GOOD. So healthy, it puts me to shame.

Friday evening we went and had Mexican food for dinner at a little restaurant just a few doors away from Chez Auer. I had a lovely veggie buritto, but couldn’t eat it all, as it was HUGE.
After we ate, Mark and Jon went back to the apartment to ‘dude-out’ for a while and Michelle and Darian took me to get my nails done. What an unusual experience that was. You know that I’m not much of a girly girl don’t you. Anyone who knows me, knows that. I have never in my whole life had a manicure before. It was actually quite relaxing. The hand massage was the best bit. So now I have a French manicure (laa-dee-daa) and it’s like I have someone else’s fingers. It’s bizarre. They’re all shiny. It was a nice treat, and it’s always good to try something new isn’t it?

Then we went to the cinema to see Inglorious Basterds, which was hilarious and bonkers. Quentin Tarantino never fails to make extreme violence entertaining. I had no idea it was such a long film. It’s around 3 hours long. I’d been up since 5.30am, so I struggled a little and almost dropped off a couple of times. That’s not a criticism of the film, I was just tired. It’s a good film – maybe a little too long. There were a few sequences that could have been shorter, but then you just know they made them uncomfortably long, just to mess with your mind. You KNOW what’s coming, but they make you wait. I guess it’s part of the art.

Pooped – sleep.

Los Angeles

Not all that much to report on Los Angeles really, apart from the temperature. We arrived around 8.30pm and it was warm and very humid. No hassle with immigration or customs. Breezed through quite quickly really. By the time we got to our hotel for the night, The Hilton, we were pretty tired. We got a lovely room on the 9th floor with two double beds and air con. It was very comfortable and very well sound-proofed. We both slept well. Up at 5.30am (urgh) to get ourselves back to the airport for our 8.30 flight to Seattle. Saw the sun rise, which isn’t something I see that often.


Isn't this exactly the type of roof you expect to see Jack Bauer running across at any minute?


Hazy sunrise over LA.

The 2 hour flight to Seattle was comfortable, just like I remember. If you’re doing any internal flights around the USA try Alaska Airlines out. I’ve been impressed each time I’ve used them.
We didn’t see any evidence of the fires we’ve all been hearing about around LA.

The flight

Did I mention that business class rules? Heehee. Reclining chairs with adjustable lumbar support. AND they transform into fully flat beds! It makes a whole world of difference when you can lie down and relax properly.
Makes me wonder if we’ll ever be able to travel economy again. It’s kind of like air conditioning in a car or getting a dishwasher. Once you’ve experienced these things, you can never go back.

The flight was very smooth, just a little turbulence here and there. Watched 2 films on the way over, the latest Star Trek and Knowing (Nicolas Cage). Both pretty good. Looking forward to seeing the new Terminator film on the way back.

The one and only glitch on the whole flight, was with the food. They had no record of us ordering a vegetarian meal, so there were none on board. Apparently, it’s not something they get a lot of requests for. It was pretty annoying, as I had my flight confirmation right there (which I waved at them) which stated our food choice.
Luckily, we’d filled up in the airport lounge, stuffing our faces with the novelty of FREE FOOD! The flight crew were great though. They were very apologetic and did everything they could to make sure we were looked after. They even shared the crew food with us, so we did finally get something to eat. We just had to wait until till 2 hours after the passengers ate, when the crew got their dinner. So they gave us a baked potato with cheese, some salad and couscous, houmous and falafel. It was REALLY nice and more than made up for the cock-up. It was tasty proper food, not some poncey blue cheese and walnut tart bullshit that you usually get. People seem to think that vegetarians need to be impressed with fancy food, laced with fat. NOT TRUE. Give me something basic and tasty, that’s all I want.

The crew over-compensated for the rest of the flight, bringing us every type of food they could find. We were given fresh fruit, salad, chocolates, copious cups of tea and glasses of wine. Basically as much as we could eat and drink.

I tried to get a picture of Las Vegas as we flew over it, as it looked very cool. But you just can't hold the camera still enough for a long exposure on a moving plane, so this is all I got.

On our way to the USofA

Business Class rules!
Politely and quickly checked in, fast tracked through security, welcomed by name to the business class lounge with comfy chairs, free food and drink. And we’re not even on the plane yet!
I could get used to this.
Normally a delayed flight means stress and getting annoyed. Funnily enough, the fact that our 4.15pm flight has just been delayed till 6pm isn’t bothering me. Maybe it’s the Diazepam tablet I took half an hour ago? Maybe it’s the glass of J.D and coke I have in my hand? Either way – BOVERED?
The only disappointment is the lack of public wi-fi. There’s a network here, but the signal strength is pants and I can’t get connected. Ho hum, could be worse eh? We could be sitting it out in the cattle class plastic chairs being charged extortionate prices for a bottle of water. Captive audiences – the capitalists best friend!
Sadly, there’s only so long (about 15 mins) that my crappy laptop will last on battery power, so I couldn’t take advantage of the wi-fi even if it was working.