Two days ago i was in London, for a one night stopover for work to learn some stuff that i need to teach some people in Hong Kong next month. What happened? We went out for a few drinks and the person who was supposed to teach me never made it in the next day. I should be fine right? So i had a normal day at work and was supposed to meet a mate for a beer then hang out in the business class lounge just to see how the other side live. Fast forward to when i’m waiting for the aforementioned friend and i decide to double-check my printout to see how much time we have to drink. Turns out i’d been looking at the arrival time. Time to get the fuck out of dodge.

Fast forward a bit further an i’m scrambling for sleep at home with the promise of a late shift the following day beckoning, and only two more days till my Mum arrives for three weeks of travel through the Scottish Highlands and visiting the relo’s in Austria. I awake to a phone call from my Sister to say that Mum has broken her leg on a train and the doctors are refusing to let her travel.

My mind goes into overdrive. I have three main options. A) Cancel my holidays and go into work to help out the guys with their new roll-out plans… B) Keep my holidays and do the things i had booked with Mum anyway and fill in the gaps with some trips to Old Trafford or something…or C) Cancel everything and high-tail it to Oz…

No-brainer!

So now i’m sitting on a plane with the sudden realisation that i will be home in a day or so… Was there a board meeting at Qantas at some stage where some young upstart thought it would be a good idea to enrich the on-board entertainment radio channels with intermittent static to give the effect of Vinyl? If so it appears he was overruled by some geriatric who decided the gramophone needed a comeback…seriously..what the fuck? The movie channels are fine.

I have to warn you about my writing style at the moment though. I’m easily influenced by what i do, read, write and see, when it comes to creating my own work. Look at my accent…this is not a conscious effort on my part..this is just how it happens…like a Lufthansa cancellation policy…this is just how it is. Whatever i read or watch seems to influence how i tend to write. So keep in mind i’ve been watching mainly Family Guy every night before falling asleep. Anyone who gets a chance to read my journal can probably pick the time-frame when i was reading Kurdt’s journals.

After 5 beers and two red wines, Hot Tub Time Machine is a great movie. Only time will tell if i was swayed by the bottle…John Cusack is good. Good. The best adjective i have at my disposal at this time. Now I’m watching the A-team and keeping the people to my left and right awake with my ultra-backlit screen.

I’m finding myself increasingly sympathising with the fat nerdy characters in movies…Alan from The Hangover is my idol..but the fat kid from Hot Tub Time Machine and Kick Ass is holding his own in the stakes for my undying partiality. Third movie in a row…The Green Zone. Seriously..currency plates? Haven’t i seen this before? I don’t even think this was a movie…it may have just been an episode of Jag or something…

This is my first time flying standby by myself…usually i have Phong to guide me and run with the ball. I’m not ungrateful for the discount from Leish…far from it…i just don’t think i’m cut out for the standby game. It’s why i’m not cut out for the contracting game. Sure the financial benefits of both are great, but the positives don’t outweigh the negatives for someone who puts very little worth on fiscal buoyancy.

Phong had a good theory today as to why i am perennially late for flights. When other people are involved, i’m like an hour early and everything organised…to compensate. When i’m left up to my own devices i just don’t care enough what happens to divert the resources towards the goal…if it doesn’t work for me it doesn’t work and was probably not meant to be. It’s fatalism with a splash of indifference.

So speaking as someone who is perennially late to flights i don’t think i’ve ever been more pissed off at late-comers than watching the smarmy bastards walking through security to the gate tonight with 20 minutes to go before take-off. It’s a fucking International flight! One of the longest flights you can possibly take. Where were the Heathrow Terminal 5 tyrant fuckers when you need them? Fucks sake i went and bought another ticket and still made it through check in and they wouldn’t let me in and these fuckers just waltz through like its the Wigan defence on one of the days that they don’t pull a victory out of their arse.

By the way..the plan is to stay awake for the entire Frankfurt Singapore Leg…in the hope that i can sleep the second leg and wake up on Australian time. Stay tuned for more sleep deprived hilarity. I’ve been up for 21 hours as it stands….

Of course this could all go tit’s up if i don’t get the next flight. Then i have to wait up till the following morning or shell out for a hotel in Singland. Exactly how respectable do i have to look to get on these Standby flights? Stay tuned…

So i just completed a master-course in cinematic endurance. My word i’ve seen some bad movies but having just persevered through Russell Crowe’s Robin Hood i feel am capable of withstanding anything. Surely this is one of the levels of hell. Seriously, this is the most fetid, pompous tripe i have ever seen on the screen. Russ must have been sitting there with his other Kiwi buddies watching a Marathon of 300, Gladiator – probably more than once – and Braveheart and thought…why can’t i make a movie like this? But you can Russ! I don’t know though…seems like a lot of work. Remember Gladiator? That took fucking forever. Alright, let’s save some time then and just redo a movie that’s already been done….several times….and use the cinematic experience from all these other movies that have also been done…many times over. Ok i’m warming to the project…do we have to do anything to it? I don’t know…maybe we just change it up a bit…make a few changes here and there. OK like what? Well….what parts do people like of 300? Well the fights scene’s Russ. Well let’s just have a lot of fight scenes. Fuck it, make Maid Marion fight. And that fat cunt Tuck. He can fight too. I like it Russ…but what makes that different from Kevin Costner’s one? Besides the lack of a Brian Adam’s soundtrack? Not a whole lot…hmmm. Ok what about….bare with me….what about…we make him hardly ever use a bow and arrow throughout the movie. Seriously…we can have him kill people with swords and spears and axes and shit like that.

Then it’s Gladiator you dickhead.

I think the only way this movie experience could have been worse is had i been watching it on a Ryanair flight into or out of Germany so that clap-happy audience could clap all the way through every time Russ delivers a load of wank speech in the stylee of Mel…what is it with all the Australian wannabe’s trying to make epic films? The only surprise was that he didn’t try to write the score for the film or include a few tracks from 30 Odd foot of grunt on the soundtrack…

Me to old biddy #1 to my left: That baby has not made a sound all flight…it’s incredible
Old biddy #1: Apparently it’s done like 30 flights or so.
Amazed me: Fuck off!
Old biddy #2: She’s 13 months old…*Turns to father/Son in law* How many flights has she done?
Father of the year: This is her 52nd flight… She’s clocked over 140,000 air miles
Aussie lad in row behind: Fuck, that’s child abuse…

Father of the year didn’t get it….

So i finally land after 23 hours in the air. Do the rounds to the parents houses and a bit of shopping as i only bought one pair of pants and managed to get chocolate on them during the flight. We have Father’s day lunch at some schmick restaurant on the water before heading back to my sister’s gaff. The 18th wind has kicked in now as we head to the pub to watch the mighty dragons slay the rabbitohs. Minor premier’s this year…still even diehard fans are trying to work out if it will be the first or second round when the inevitable choke occurs.

Roughly 50 hours awake in total…

So here are all the clips of managed to find (so far) of a really great show! They shat all over the last time i saw them in Sydney before they broke up way back when.

The first clip is from my shitty camera uploaded on to Youtube. The breakdown/whistling part is apparently a Kraftwerk song who were playing the other stage at the time. I could watch it 1000 times when he turns back to the drummer to go back into the song…fricking awesome! You can watch it in proper quality in the clip below it.