Well, the difficult reality is that tomorrow I have to dispense with my jetset existence and board a final Qantas flight home. I know you all feel sorry for me. While I think of it, you'll no doubt be interested to know that I rate LAN Chile the best airline of this trip, followed by Copa (new planes, efficient and organised). Iberia (Spain) was serviceable as always, if lacking in any glamour, but they don't seem stressed about you turning up for a flight at the last minute which is nice. British Airways is second last on the list at the moment, due to surly staff and stale sandwiches and ignoring my request for a chocolate bar. That may all be because I flew out of Manchester. Coming a very definite last is TAME (Ecuador) who are still flying 727s and I will be happy never to ride in one of them again. While I'm sure there'll be some cultural cringe upon boarding Qantas, all I care about is a functional personal video screen.
So I've had the last few days in New York catching up with my friends Paul and Teddy and Demond which has been great. Culturally, I went and saw Kathleen Turner last night in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, which was kind of odd in that some moments were great, and other times it seemed a bit all over the shop. Kathleen has definitely grown into the role in many ways, but I suspect there's a diminishing range of roles in her future, in tandem with the diminishing range of her voice. Soon she'll be competing with James Earl Jones.
My cultural experiences today involved shopping in Soho where there was a relative lack of bargains (damn I wish I bought those Campers I liked in Spain), an overwhelming amount of humidity, but some purchases nonetheless.
