Rhonda Bracey: At Random

I met Craig today. I’ve been following Craig’s blog for about 3 years, since just before he left Melbourne to live in Seattle. I don’t even remember how I stumbled on his blog, but I’ve been following his life as an Aussie in the US since that first post I read. Until today, I’d never met Craig — he was just a voice on a blog; an Aussie voice, but just a voice nonetheless. And there’s always a sense of trepidation meeting someone for the first time and putting your life in their hands.

Our paths didn’t cross last year, but this year we were both in the same city at the same time. We were going to do brunch and then he was going to take me to the airport. Unfortunately, his car battery died as he got to the hotel to pick me up, so after the AAA came out and replaced it, we headed off in the rain to Redmond, Bellevue etc. as Craig thought I’d like to get some idea of the size of the Microsoft ‘city’ of buildings. Wow!  It’s HUGE! Then it was off to the airport, and ultimately we didn’t get to have that brunch as time just ran out. However, we did spend a bit of time driving around Seattle in the rain, just gabbing!

I liked Craig immediately — I thought I would, as he comes across as such a nice guy from his posts. He’s a funny, likeable, and genuine nice bloke. I can see why his Mum is as proud as punch of him — and I know his late Dad was equally as proud of him.

Thanks for taking me to the airport today, Craig. I really appreciated it — and really appreciated meeting you. You make the world a happier place.

I caught a very full flight from Seattle to Los Angeles today. There were many announcements pre-boarding and when we were on the aircraft about how the plane was totally full and how all large carry-ons should go in the overhead lockers with smaller carry-ons put under the seat in front of us. The attendants even gave instructions on the best way to maximise space by telling us how to put our wheeled carry-ons into the overhead locker. All good so far and pretty much everyone seemed to be doing the right thing, with some even helping others sort out the limited overhead space to get the most out of it.

So what sort of d*ickhead was the guy (in his 50s no less) who sat in Row 14 but decided to dump one of his bags into the overhead lockers in Row 10 on his way down to Row 14? The Row 10 people then had less room to put their stuff.

Not fair. Rude. Selfish bastard. These were some of the words that sprang to mind… I won’t repeat the other words I thought of!