Feeling a little ordinary ...

I jumped cheerfully out of bed at 7 this morning, wanting to have breakfast with friends and then pick up a few crafty pieces before leaving Christchurch. That part of the day went well. We even caught the bus back to our friends' house and were met there by our other friends who had taken the van to Akoroa at 6 that morning, but were back in time to take us to the airport.

It was at the airport that things started going horribly wrong.

I have just spent 11 hours going from Christchurch to Sydney, a journey that usually takes five from check in to customs clearance. There was a hijacking at the airport this morning. In a city where people driving around in cars and stealing internet makes the paper. Where people are STILL discussing the All Black's loss in the Rugby World Cup last year. Happily, no one was seriously injured in the incident, though there was some medium-level stabbage.

As a result everything was carp, but they would not say hijacking, they declared that our plane had been delayed due to 'operational issues'.

This was after J's plane over was delayed by four hours due to an enormous lightning storm. We had friends on each of these flights, they now accept my edict that J is not to be travelled with as he exudes the aura of delay. Let us not speak of his bad service curse.

But J's evil passenger curse was in full swing, three of the ugliest little boys you have ever seen given full rein to run up and down the plane shouting and wailing, and all the toys their adults had packed were loud noisemakers. I wanted to sedate the kids and sterilise and then eject the adults. Only a DVD of Cambridge Spies and noise cancelling headphones saved me from a heartfelt shout of "Would you control your ghastly children?!"

There were many other small children on the plane, they were all lovely. I wonder if their parents can run training programmes?

I have decided to ignore dinner and sleep for a few hours, then wake up and write the remaining 3/4 of the story I wanted to have finished by the time I landed. I stopped writing on the plane, because it actually had no role for an infanticidal maniac.

NZ was in all other ways splendid. I thoroughly recommend the entire country, just fly Emirates, Singapore or Air New Zealand.

Feeling a little ordinary ...

I jumped cheerfully out of bed at 7 this morning, wanting to have breakfast with friends and then pick up a few crafty pieces before leaving Christchurch. That part of the day went well. We even caught the bus back to our friends' house and were met there by our other friends who had taken the van to Akoroa at 6 that morning, but were back in time to take us to the airport.

It was at the airport that things started going horribly wrong.

I have just spent 11 hours going from Christchurch to Sydney, a journey that usually takes five from check in to customs clearance. There was a hijacking at the airport this morning. In a city where people driving around in cars and stealing internet makes the paper. Where people are STILL discussing the All Black's loss in the Rugby World Cup last year. Happily, no one was seriously injured in the incident, though there was some medium-level stabbage.

As a result everything was carp, but they would not say hijacking, they declared that our plane had been delayed due to 'operational issues'.

This was after J's plane over was delayed by four hours due to an enormous lightning storm. We had friends on each of these flights, they now accept my edict that J is not to be travelled with as he exudes the aura of delay. Let us not speak of his bad service curse.

But J's evil passenger curse was in full swing, three of the ugliest little boys you have ever seen given full rein to run up and down the plane shouting and wailing, and all the toys their adults had packed were loud noisemakers. I wanted to sedate the kids and sterilise and then eject the adults. Only a DVD of Cambridge Spies and noise cancelling headphones saved me from a heartfelt shout of "Would you control your ghastly children?!"

There were many other small children on the plane, they were all lovely. I wonder if their parents can run training programmes?

I have decided to ignore dinner and sleep for a few hours, then wake up and write the remaining 3/4 of the story I wanted to have finished by the time I landed. I stopped writing on the plane, because it actually had no role for an infanticidal maniac.

NZ was in all other ways splendid. I thoroughly recommend the entire country, just fly Emirates, Singapore or Air New Zealand.