Flying and Reading

I did two things yesterday. I flew to Athens for a short visit home, and I read Suzanne Collins 'The Hunger Games".

The flight wasn't bad. I was stressed about managing to reach the airport in time, because it was an early morning flight and I live on the exact opposite side of London from Heathrow. I took the Piccadilly line right from one end of the line to the other. It took about one and a half hours.

Once there things I dropped my bags really fast - I had checked in online to save time - and rushed to the security check. As usual I forgot about the liquid thing and ended up downing a whole (small) bottle of water before going through - it's a pity to throw away water when you've carted all the way from home!

Security check was the usual bleurgh. I was forced to take of my boots - even though they had obviously thin rubber soles- , and my cardigan, - even though obviously a cardigan isn't a coat. I made the BIG mistake of forgetting to take off my badge which set the alarm off as I passed through the door. So ended up being THOROUGHLY frisked - first by hand and then by hand held bleepy machine. The machine thingy bleeped when she passed it near my bust - it seems like the under-wiring of a bra is enough to set it off.

I was far too tired to enjoy the airport shops - I hadn't slept the night before - so I took the shuttle to my boarding gate practically immediately. Well, I did try buying my father a box of cigarettes first, but was summarily informed that only people travelling outside the EU can buy cigarettes at the airport. (What?)

Once I was finally chilling in the waiting area, I tried doing a bit of net surfing only to realise that Heathrow airport doesn't have free wi-fi! WTF!?! Athens airport has free wifi (granted only one hour), but they are so cheap in Heathrow they make you pay? That got me very annoyed. So I decided I better forget updating LJ and twitter and return to my book instead.


I returned to Athens for a number of reasons, and I have made myself a nice big list of things to do:

1. See family and friends.
2. Get my return of taxes, because I'm broke and need all the money I can scrounge up. (Done! Did it this morning.)
3. Bring back summer clothes and take winter clothes back to London.
4. Visit dentist for my tri-annual cleaning, because dentists in the UK are far too expensive. (Booked appointment for tomorrow.)
5. Get haircut (because hairdressers are far too expensive in UK. And anyway my mother offered to pay for me to go to her hairdresser.)
6. Visit my beautician for electrolysis/photolysis (because, yes, even that is cheaper in Greece.)
7. Buy stuff I can't seem to find in London (argyle clay for face-masks, my organic hair-dye, some cheap but good olive oil soap, my Apivita facial cleanser, some scraps of fabric - they sell left over scraps here really cheap if you know where to go)
8. Print some business cards - because I know good value shops to go to for that in Athens, but haven't a clue where to go in London.
9. Photograph some of the buildings in Athens I worked on for my portfolio.
10. Try to find where I put my old architecture sketches from university.
11. See if I can get the glasses I broke fixed - no one would do in London where I asked.

And well, that's all I can remember now. But I'm sure to add more to that list soon enough.


You know, this post ended up so huge, I'll make another one later with my thoughts about the Hunger Games.

I've got to cook anyway.