Do They Have Statuettes For Dubious Honours?

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I think I can avoid the "wow, what should be my devastatingly witty first sentence of my first blog for my entirely new second year?" dilemma by just writing exactly what I'm thinking. Which is that the second I stepped foot on the plane from Boston, the completely flat line that was my summer started zigzagging and looping crazily off the heart-monitor screen. I mean, I figured that the universe sort of owed me something after the debacle of having to unload ten kilos from one of my checked bags at Logan Airport (as everyone else in line removed the scissors and nail files from their purses, not in order to present them at the security checkpoint but in order to kill me), but I did not figure that that thing would be a gorgeous sailor from Ipswich in 44G. I'm convinced, looking back, that Virgin Atlantic Flight 012 is actually a carefully selected code name for an alternate fantasy universe, more fantastical even than the one they were creating in Llantwit yesterday for yet another -apparently tight budgeted - spinoff of Doctor Who (we walked right through the tent they were filming from on the way to the train station. I waved at one of the extras taking a five-minute break in the makeup tent and shrieked when I realised that he had no face.). You see, in the real world, I don't wake up at three in the morning because the woman in the seat in front of me is screaming "OH MY GOD! JOE! JOE! SOMEONE HELP! DOCTOR!DOCTOR! SOMEONE!" At first I thought she was having some sort of nightmare, until she turned on her light and I noticed the man next to her, still and slumped in front of his in-flight entertainment. Lights went on and headphones were removed from ears in the entire section, but naturally there were no doctors sitting in the economy class. There was however, someone who had passed the basic CPR course in CAVRA last year. Just barely. I'd like to explain how I was feeling but I didn't really feel anything, just unbuckled my self in a half-asleep daze wondering if I was still dreaming. After about the fifteenth chest compression I realised that I had never done mouth-to-mouth on someone who wasn't a plastic dummy, and -to put it ridiculously lightly- luckily he started breathing again before I got to thirty, and a real doctor had arrived. One perk of saving a guy's life is that you get bumped up to first class, where I enjoyed fresh blueberries and warm oatmeal raisin cookies for the remaining three hours. Yes, WARM oatmeal raisin cookies. It almost made me want to become a doctor. However a slightly more useful perk would have been a dedicated valet service all the way to Wales, as over 100 pounds of luggage - the largest suitcase with a broken handle and a stuck zipper - is not all that fun to sweatily navigate through the streets of London. I don't know what I would've done if I hadn't been a woman, with the free service of Extremely Chivalrous Men On Public Transport that the British government apparently provides. I ended up meeting a lot of people this way, which was both interesting and functional, and apparently having oversized luggage makes me look a lot older, because I was legitimately asked "So...your husband will be coming to help you with all this, then?" and "Oh, Atlantic College...I've heard of it actually. Do you teach there?" Yes, of course. Funny you should ask...I've been principal for twenty years. I hardly ate when I finally arrived at supper because there was too much to talk about. So, I made it to the back of Filco's (where I ran into my Spanish teacher by chance. So instead of spending my four quid on a cab I was able to by a pair of hot-pink flocked flats at the Qube sale in Cardiff...priotities, priorities) in the rain with luggage that weighed more than I do, I have finally met my soulmate on a transatlantic flight, I saved a guy's life, AND I have now paid for my four Mamma Mia! tickets with three different types of currency. My golden statue would just have to be made out of helium so that it would not add any weight to my battered red suitcase.

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