Book ends

After about 35 hours of travel, I made it back to Christchurch! The trip started out with a slight delay on Monday. President Obama did a quick campaign stop in Madison on Monday and happened to finish just as I was on my way to the airport. As I was getting ticketed, the runways were locked down as the President (and, almost as important, Bruce Springsteen :-)) arrived. I made it to my gate just as the stairs were being moved away from the plane and got to watch Air Force One take off!

The only really stressful part of the trip happened while I was squeezed into the middle seat on the L.A. to Sydney flight. A couple of hours after they'd turned off the lights I managed to drop my glasses on the floor. Because of the seat in front of me and the people on either side of me, I couldn't reach the floor. I spent about an hour intermittently trying different methods to reach my glasses and finally managed to extend one of the earpieces and grab it with the tips of my fingers. It probably seems mundane, but the thought of spending a month squinting at a screen made the effort seem like something out of an action movie. Today I need to go try on my extreme weather gear and get ready for (I hope) tomorrow's flight. P.S. As for the bookend, I got to my hotel room yesterday evening, turned on my WiFi, and within ~10 minutes my daughter Skyped me that Obama had won. So the trip almost literally began and ended with Obama!