Tuesday 23rd October 2018

It is now the time of year when getting up to travel to Denmark means getting up in the dark, driving to the station in the dark, and getting almost all the way to London in the dark, meaning that looking out of the window only reveals my own reflection staring back.

I had been home only just over two days, but here I was on my way to another airport for another flight, just as well I don’t mind my restless feet, but then I am looking forward to next week at home. Just have to get through this week first.

I had packed sand prepared the day before, meaning all I had to do was remember to pack my pills from beside the bed. This I failed to do, just as well I am not life dependant on them, then.

Jools makes coffee, feeds the cats, and I stumble downstairs are another night of fractured sleep.

We leave the house at quarter to six, a gentle drizzle is falling which matches my mood. After buying my ticket, I sit under the station canopy, enjoying the cool temperatures and silence surrounding the station.

By the time the train arrives, there is a dozen of us waiting, so we get on, spread ourselves around the train before it pulls out again. And being half term week, the train wasn’t full until we reached Ebbsfleet, and by then it was just light enough to see dawn creeping over south Essex and East London before the train went down into the tunnel to Stratford.

Breakfast as normal in the café above the platforms, then catch the DLR to the airport to drop my bag off. I had checked in and e mailed myself an e ticket, but turns out that the barcode cannot be ready by the scanners for either the automatic bag drop off and the security gates, meaning they are no use whatsoever. Does not improve my mood to be waiting in line to have my case checked in.

But I am done and through security with no trouble, and find a place to sit and read while I wait for the gate to be called.

That happens twenty minutes before departure time, with the plane just over half full, I slip into my usual seat in 8A and settle down to read as the plane is made ready to take off.

I even have lunch, or 2nd breakfast as it turns out, but it would mean that I should not too hungry through the afternoon once at work.

The flight was a little different, in that the plane crossed the coast directly above Lowestoft, and looking down I could see my hometown laid out like a map, and even see where my old house in Hall Road still is.

So, over the sea to Denmark, and the dark clouds roll in and the wind blows, so as the plane drops to land, it is buffeted and leaps around like a frisky Shetland pony. But we land safe and sound, and walking out of the aircraft to cross to the terminal it feels very much like the end of October.

I am asked to take a mini bus for the week by the car hire people, which I accept as there is a demand from the boss to care share on the drive up to Aalborg, and so this will kill the “who has the biggest car” debate stone dead. And I would be driving.

The drive to the office is as it always is, with added wind and rain this time.

And at the office I am once again confronted by an inbox with 550 unread mails, and the task seeming too big to know where to start, but I know that mails from Monday onwards need to be dealt with, so I do that.

At five, I drive to the hotel, and am confronted by the car park in front of it full, usually this would not be an issue as there is a large underground car park to use, but this has a height restriction, and the bus too high. I do spy an empty space and so take a ticket and get that final spot so I can at least get to the hotel.

After checking in, I go to my room, and just about stay awake listening to some music before I leave to walk down to the Smokehouse where I am to meet a colleague and her boyfriend for dinner.

It is just a ten minute walk down the backstreets to the side of the canal were the restaurant is, and they were waiting for me, waiving from the table next to the kitchen. We were told, it is ribs night, a full rack for the price of half. I’m not that hungry, but the full rack arrives anyway, and we all three plough through a small mountain of meat. Heck, the cooks even give us extra portions of fries too, just make us that little bit fuller.

I don’t finish all the ribs, as I had the idea to wander down to the Highlander, Selma and her boyfriend join me, and we are rewarded by finding Chimay Blue Grande Reserve on tap. And it only comes in pints!

Just as well he bails after just the one, as my head is still scrambled by some mild jetlag and lack of sleep, so after drowning our beers we all walk back up the hill to the art museum where we part ways and I walk to the hotel, finding it to be half ten already and well past my bedtime.