2 Continents, an inflatable kangaroo, and those little white bags on airplanes

Nobody who flies on planes a lot likes flying on planes a lot.  Still, it beats driving, walking, or, uh, swimming to get to where you wanna go.  The blog has been a little sparse lately because I took several, really-long, plane rides, which, judging by the fact that I’m back now and not stranded on an island with polar bears and smoke monsters, were successful.  I went to Sydney and Singapore, which I’ve learned are actually farther away than they looked on my globe growing up.  (like a quarter-turn and I went from the West Coast to Asia – not a big deal.)

A few things I learned/observed during my travels:

• Being upgraded 30 seconds before you board a 14 hour flight feels an awful lot like somebody ringing your doorbell while you’re writing your mortgage check and handing you a bag of hundred dollar bills.  I’m guessing…
• Ambien totally works
• Sydney is an awesome place and they love them the tourists.  Also, so many people called me their “mate” that the Mrs. HTF has reason to be jealous.
• Went for a jog around the Opera House, botanical garden and the harbor bridge, which other than dingos and marsupials are like the only Australian things I recognize – best jog evah!
• Sometimes the perfect gift for my kids is standing in a window wearing boxing gloves.  This was the case with the 3.5 foot tall inflatable kangaroo that’s now a fixture in our family room.
• Harbor Cruise was awesome.  We saw some sweet views, some houses worth $50 million, and a smallish island which we nicknamed “Tasmania.”  The cruise was slightly less awesome during the torrential rains.  Sadly my fish & chips didn’t hold up well.  And for “seafood” that fish didn’t taste very good after being drenched.
• Flight to Singapore delayed 8 hours, so I pulled into the hotel at 4 AM.  Good morning!!
• Singapore is a lot like South Florida except much cleaner, the people are way nicer, fewer alligators/snakes, and most people there speak better English than I do.  (not a stretch)
• I’m not a shopper, but if I was I’d visit Singapore often.  Technically speaking – the shiny stuff in the shops was stunning.
• The place feels like it was all built in the last 2 years – again, much shininess.
• The flight home was horrific as everything that was on my inside suddenly wanted to be on the outside.  You’d think this would be fine after a time or two, but I got to have essentially a 15-18 hour party with those surprisingly (and thankfully) strong “motion sickness” bags stuffed in the seat in front of me and/or the squeaky clean restrooms in Tokyo on the layover.  The good part was that with the time changes I literally landed in Seattle before I took off from Singapore (wrap your head around that), so it was like the whole thing never happened.

All said it was an awesome trip and I got to hang out and work with some marvelous people who may or may not ever speak to me again.  I leave you with this important photo I took at a Sydney park, which is TOTALLY clear: