Vietnam here I come

I leave home around 13:00 again. My flight being a bit after 17:00. Not that I think it will take hours to complete all the formalities, I just want to take full advantage of the lounge.

Schiphol is nice and empty. It takes no time to check in and go through security and all that shit. There isn’t even much of a queue for passport control.

A young black bloke is getting quite agitated at security. They get an older Surinamese security guy to talk to him. Who is very calm. Turns out he had a little pistol ornament on his key ring. Which they confiscate.

I pick up a bottle of Ardmore and six miniatures of Jack Daniels. I'll need those for the flight.

The lounge isn't too busy. I get stuck into my usual whisky/whiskey combination. And a bit of scran. While reading Private Eye. Which I’m still way behind with. The issue is so old, Lizz Truss is still PM. Whatever happened to her?

I don’t go too crazy. Just four or five rounds of whiskies. Or maybe six. Who’s counting? A couple of plates of food, too. Cheese, ham, olives. Snacky things.

I time going to the gate pretty well and only have to stand around a few minutes before it's time for my pushy-in boarding. I’m getting so good at this. It’s almost like I do it often.

Seated, the lights suddenly go off. The pilot announces that there's a small technical problem. That will take at least 30 minutes to fix. Great. In the meantime, the aircon is off. It soon starts getting quite sweaty. Good preparation for conditions in Vietnam, I suppose.

They manage to fix the problem reasonably quickly. Basically, by switching the faulty system off and on again. Not sure how reassured I am by that.

By now we've missed our take-off slot. Another half hour, the pilot says, until we’ll be able to take off. Mmm. I've only got a couple of hours between flights in Bangkok. I can’t afford too much of a delay.

Luckily, we’re able to take another flight’s slot. And leave only about 45 minutes late. Only. 

The flight is pretty full. Which seems to always be the case again now. No more of the nice quiet planes around Covid time.

The meal is sort of OK. Though my expectations are low. I manage to eat most of it. Once I’ve eaten, I top up my wine with the whiskey miniatures. That’s better. They warm me up a treat. And start getting me in the mood for sleeping later.

I finish watching series 2 of Frayed, which I started on my last trip. Then continue with Mr. Mayor. Which isn't totally terrible. Not totally great, either. I do almost laugh a couple of times.

Then I kip. Quite a god kip, considering. A good 5 or 6 hours. Which eats up a good chunk of the flight. Exactly what I wanted.