Friday 22nd November 2024

And time to go home.

Having gone to bed at a sensible time, instead of a lay in, I was awake at half five, so lay in the darkness and listened to the end of Word in Your Ear before leaping into action.

I wash, get dressed and begin to pack, going round the room and bathroom twice to make sure I had everything.

One last look over my shoulder, and I walk out, over the bridge to the side where the elevators are, then down to the lobby to pay the bill, before going for one last breakfast.

I see no colleagues as I much a bowl of pineapple, then get a fresh roll, butter and crispy streaky bacon to make a second course so high mere mouths struggled to get round it.

I am as early as previous day, but then I prefer the light traffic, and with yet more frost, it was best to take one's time with as few distractions as possible.

I get to the offices, my two colleagues were not yet in, so wait in the lobby of we were going to our dedicated area of open plan office.

Henrik arrives, and he takes me up, directing me to one of the cooler hot desks, so I can set up and tackle the inbox that has been filling up daily.

We work through the morning, have an actual fat to face meeting with our new interim manager and outline some issues.

Then it was a dash down to the canteen for lunch, before the final closing meeting from the auditors, where we would be in the presence of the company's top management. Or should have been, but it would appear that a meeting at 12:30 on Friday is close to the weekend, or they were all washing their hair or something.

With news of snow in west Jutland, I made my excuses and went to pack my laptop up, and went back down to do another round of hand-shaking.

I was right to leave early, and take my time.

I drove to the motorway, then tucked in the slow land behind a line of trucks as we drove through 30km of roadworks.

I turned off at J57, where a huge service station has now been built, then along to the short stretch of motorway heading west.

I arrived at Billund well ahead of schedule, so parked up just before the roundabout and put on a podcast. Then I saw in the rear view mirror, a hire car jack-knife off the road into a drift of snow. He managed to reverse out, but had blocked the road in both directions for a few minutes.

Into the airport to drop the car off, then into the terminal to try to check in early. After 14 years of using the same gate, British Airways now are on the other side of departures, and with no BA sign, wasn't sure if I'd have to wait 20 minutes until two hours before the flight.

I asked a lady, and she said, no worries, she had opened the flight, so I checked in my case and was able to go to security, where there was no line, so through in a couple of minutes, then up the escalator to the duty free shop.

I bought Jools a Lego Landrover for her birthday, then went to the old Gastropub for a beer and some crisps, to while away the 90 minutes before boarding.

The box in which the Lego came in was huge, and I began to regret buying it almost straight away, but I could just tuck it under an arm, and get along like that. It would be harder once I had my case, but should be alright.

The flight was full, as one earlier flight had been cancelled, and some transferred to ours. So we were fully laden when we took off, though most of that was the various Lego sets most of us had bought.

Lights twinkled down below as we flew down the Danish coast, then along Northern Germany and into and over Netherlands.

The stewardess does well is going round with drinks, then dinner, then aperitifs and finally ice cream, then collects the rubbish. All in about an hour and twenty minutes.

I only have a Coke and ice cream, read my book and look out of the window occasionally.

Onto final approach, only for the plane to do a 360 degree turn over the Dartford Crossing, but us only about a thousand feet up. Back onto final, along the river before touching down.

Into the fresh air, where it was cool, but seven degrees above freezing, and not that breezy. So glad I didn't put my jacket on, a dash into the terminal, a walk to immigration, though the scanners in seconds and to baggage reclaim, all while carrying the huge Lego box.

My case was on the wrong belt, but I noticed it, with the Lego under one arm, pushing the case with the other and by work bag swinging, I made my way to the station, where I had a two minute wait for a train to Stratford.

Normally its standing room only at seven in the evening, but I got a seat, so the twenty minute run went quickly.

Even the queue to get on the escalator to street level was all very calm and no you go first. I had missed a Dover train by 15 minutes, but one to Ashford was leaving in about twenty minutes, so I asked Jools to meet me and went down on the platform to watch Eurostars hammering through the station at speeds that sounded every bit of 187 mph.

The train had 12 cars, so had loads of seats. Even place to put my case. I close my eyes. I was suddenly very tired.

At Ashford there was a walk tot he lift, then along the passage to the exit, where Jools was waiting.

She drives us back to the motorway, then back to Dover, taking her time as she was pooped too. We get back at just gone nine, where there was time for a brew before bed called.