Miscellanea

Random things from today:

Test Flight the Second was significantly less interesting than Test Flight the First. My channel didn't work at all: a shorted lens inside the pylon (on the outside of the plane) equaled an inability to even think about fixing it. Thus, I simply had a 5-hour long ride back and forth across Nebraska in the barfomatic plane.

Yep. There were a lot of throw-ups today. Thankfully, they were not by me, or around me, or within earshot of me.

Mind you, the latter would be all but impossible.

Nevertheless, the vomit bags, which live in a little metal box at the front of the cabin near my seat, were being reached for on a very regular basis during the last hour of the flight. We were in the boundary layer for a long time (the lowest ~ 1 km of the atmosphere). Think 2 hours straight of turbulence while sitting in a sauna full of coffee grinders that just keep grinding and grinding. Bumpy, hot and loud.

Oh, and nothing outside to look at but this:

and on occasion, this:

Seriously. Nothing against Nebraska, but it's a pretty boring state from above.

Other completely unrelated tidbits:

• I forgot how much I love Snickers Almond. Much more than the version with peanuts.

• I saw an ad tonight for Corner Gas being aired on WGN! Here, in the U.S! So exciting!

• I booked myself a flight to New Zealand today. Wacky.

• I bought the first two seasons of the U.S. "The Office" today. I'm hoping that they'll keep me occupied while I'm on Christmas Island. Did I mention I'm on my way to the South Pacific? Yeah... next week. Well, if all goes well, I'll be leaving on Monday. If all doesn't go well, it might be a day or so later, or even a week... Diplomatic research permit politics. Feh.