My flight to Vancouver leaves Gatwick at 5:55am GMT on Wednesday, which is actually 9:55pm of Tuesday in Vancouver. Assigning three hours to the bus ride and three more to be sure of clearing security on time, I will be leaving Oxford – suitcases in tow – at midnight local time tomorrow. While that is setting up England-Tuesday / Canada-Wednesday to be a kind of uber-day, such is the character of the flight plan. I just hope that my brain is back on its bearings by the time we will be leaving for Tristan’s cabin on Friday morning.
Everything from now until Tuesday night is likely to be about consolidation. Packing, organizing, and otherwise preparing. The prospect of the forthcoming journey is an exciting one, indeed.
[Unrelated, but unfortunate] Steve Irwin, the self-styled ‘Crocodile Hunter,’ was killed by a stingray in Queensland today. He was frequently a model for characters generated by the Handsworth Improv Team, in which both of my brothers performed for years, and generally struck me as a decent sort of fellow. My sympathies to his family, friends, and two young children.
Re: Irwin,
While I agree that the situation is tragic – especially given his eight and three year old kids – the fact that so many news sources are calling this ‘ironic’ really bugs me.
‘Man famous for handling dangerous animals ironically killed by dangerous animal’
NOT ironic, expected
It’s like ‘Houdini ironically killed while trying to perform magic trick’
I am just surprised that it was sting ray and not a croc that got him. Stingrays are not aggressive and their venom from what Ive read is mild. The barb of the stingray just happened to hit him directly in the heart…bad luck.
And Milan we are at the opposite ends of the spectrum right now. I cant handle one more day in Canada, all I can think about is headin to Brussels. Time to pack..
Brett,
It was certainly an unusual accident, as testified to by the rarity of stingray fatalities in general. Of course, Mr. Irwin was much more exposed to dangerous animals of all kinds that most people, and was therefore at a greater danger of being injured or killed by one, regardless of his level of skill in dealing with them. Bad luck indeed.
I suppose it is entirely understandable that the longer you spend in a place, the less value another day there has. Conversely, the longer it has been since you were in a place (with which you still have many connections), the greater value any day spent there would have. Have a good trip to Brussels.
Have a safe trip. Be grateful you are now allowed to bring a book -though sleeping may be smarter.
I think it’s really sad that Mr. Irwin is dead. He clearly cared about animals, and I wish he had more time to teach people about them.