I woke up pretty early friday morning in order to induce tiredness so that I would sleep on the flight from Houston to Amsterdam at some point. In retrospect, this was a poor decision. The flight from Midland to Houston was easy. I had a three hour lay over in Houston during which time I corresponded with my mother via email from my phone. I don't know that I could have handled it otherwise. There was very little to do there. I also sent a few other emails as the opportunity presented itself, such as my email to Mark entitled, "worst food court ever".
The plane boarded about an hour prior to flight time in Houston, and as my travel agent had said, very few people sit near the galley. It must have something to do with the obnoxious flight attendants making sure that no one can sleep. It wasn't really that bad, but I feel like every time I thought I was going to fall asleep, one of them would open the curtain and shine a 9000 watt light bulb at my face. The point to be taken from this is that near the galley is comfortable and not many people sit there. There were two of us in row 24 with the center seat open, which allowed me and the Indian, proper Indian not the American variety, to spread out quite a bit and be comfortable. Bobby and I talked quite a bit at the beginning of the flight and near the end and for a while in the middle as neither of us could sleep.
As it turns out, Bobby and I had quite a bit in common, at least according to him we did. He is a diamond dealer. He was on his way to India to purchase diamonds and take them back to the US. He kept harping on this point, to which I continued to respond, "yeah", or "uh-huh". Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the company.
They showed a couple of television shows and a few movies during the flight to Amsterdam that helped out quite a bit with the boredom. Over all it was a good experience. I had a few beers and they served a pretty good lasagna for dinner and a cold "egg on a biscuit" for breakfast, and they were continually around asking if you needed somthing to drink.
In Amsterdam, both Bobby and i had layovers, so we grabbed a cup of coffee and talked for a little while longer. Interesting fact about Amsterdam, they don't worry about you stealing their coffee cups. I told the guy I might walk around, could I have a paper cup. He responded, that cup (the nice ceramic one) could go anywhere, just leave it on a table when I was finished. That would never fly in the United States because some dumb ass would steal the damn cup. After that, I went to my gate, where they screen you through security, and them make you wait in an uncomfortable room to check your passport, and then make you wait in an uncomfortable room to have your ticket ripped, and then make you walk down the jet way and wait in line again. There was a line in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy that I was reminded of, I think it was, "if there is one thing the English are good at, it is queueing up." I know I was in the Netherlands, but it reminded me of it anyway.
The flight from Amsterdam to Aberdeen is about an hour long. Nothing special happened, except that I noticed in Europe proper they call Diet Coke, "Coke Light".
My boss picked me up at the airport here in Aberdeen and brought me to my apartment. She seemed like she was in quite a hurry, so I kept telling her that she could leave and I would be ok, that we would talk Monday morning. She eventually did, and soon after I found out that my cell phone, that I was told would work here, does not work here. Following that I spent an hour trying to get a computer connected to the internet, for some reason the are still on the wireless B standard here, so the signal is bad, and it cuts in and out.
I woke up at 6 am Texas time yesterday and have still not really had any significant amount of sleep, so if mispelled a bunch of stuff or there are incoherent ramblings, attribute them to my lack of sleep.
Also, I roamed the streets here for quite a while and went grocery shopping. Two completely different experiences that I will write about at a later time. I also have some fun stories about my apartment so far that I will put up later too.
I have some pictures ready to go up, but I forgot my camera cable and my card reader, so I will put them up as soon as I get one or the other to transfer the pictures to my camera.