There's no place like home... ?

After a seriously unamusing 15 hours squished between two people, with the magical seatback entertainment failing to be magical by ceasing to work, I touched down in Sydney. After approximately 48 queues and a slight pause to rearrange my belongings because Qantas baggage handlers are lame, I transferred to the domestic flight to Canberra, inside the rowboat of the aviation world. It is a surprise that aircraft doesn't need a push start. I left Canberra with 22 kg of baggage, I returned with 62 kg.

Walking across the tarmac at Canberra I was greeted with the familiar eucalyptus-summer smell of Australia and as I went through the doors into the terminal, by a very excited toddler leaping upon my person. Fortunately one that I was equally excited to see. Said toddler has now sleeps with an NYC taxi, yellow school bus and a police car. Small toy versions that is. And gave me a similarly excited welcome when I came back from the shops. Very nice to be welcomed home in such a fashion. Canberra, aka The Ghetto, didn't welcome me back quite so nicely, after I spent a night the house of my friends I came out and found a smashed car window. I was fortunate that they were only searching for change and didn't notice that all of Christmas was inside the car, including the duty-free alcohol and perfume on the backseat. At this point I have developed such an aversion to packing - I tend to rock back and forth and ullulate for awhile whenever I have to deal with my suitcase - that I hadn't so much packed the car as moved into it, and there was such a profusion of possessions filling every available crevice that it disguised where the more valuable things were. That and the probability of them being in some state of withdrawal. Having only owned the car for 24 hours at this point I was grumpy and pouty. Fortunately I was still on LA time and so was out early enough that no-one else came along to see what they could obtain. Possibly the only time I will ever arrive at my office before 8am on a Sunday morning.

I'm now enjoying the munificence of the parenal fridge and laundry service before heading up to Sydney, because that's right, there's an exhibition I have to see that's closing this weekend. So the travel isn't quite over, if not on quite the same scale.

It's cold!