Making it to Scotland

I have been awake for a very long time.

The hours have blurred, but I believe I am past thirty.  I did manage to catch some shut eye on the plane to London, sometime in the wee hours of the night before we caught up to the rising sun, after watching Star Trek, Where the Wild Things Are, and part of Inglorious Basterds, when I finally succumbed to exhaustion and misery. 

Flying alone isn’t very fun.  And Where the Wild Things Are is apparently a really sad movie.

I think I slept for an hour.  We arrived in London Heathrow an hour late, because we left an hour late – although, I’m pretty sure I saw Air Force One parked partway on one of the runways, and there were a couple of silver security sedans surrounding the landing stairwell.  I didn’t see Obama, but it did look like they were preparing to unload somebody. Upon arriving in Heathrow, I learned two very important lessons.  I’m an idiot when I’m sleep deprived, and customs relations officers are a bunch of asshats.  It took me some time to get through customs, due to a mixture of the above.  This was followed by no less than FOUR security checks, a seven-minute bus ride, and an hour and a half later, I arrived at my terminal, where I was met with a two hour wait before I even found out what gate I was to board.  Left wondering if I’d ever see my luggage again, I walked around to stretch my abused muscles, and cracked open Faith of the Fallen.  Upon one of my infrequent “nose out of book” moments, I was greeted with the sight of Russell Brand walking down the terminal, talking on the phone, and dressed just as douche-baggy as he was in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. 

Slightly delirious from sleep deprivation, at first I wasn’t sure if I was imagining things or not – but no.  Judging by the number of people who stopped what they were doing to stare as he walked past, I’d say with fair certainity that it really happened.  I was disappointed at his attire – I for some reason assumed that actors looked totally different outside of their movies.  But no, A-grade douchebag.   

The flight to Glasgow was uneventful.  I snapped a few photos of the second sunset I had watched by plane thus far, though the photos themselves don’t do it justice. 

This, however, made my life.  A vending machine...for books.  A book vending machine. 

I am now safe and sound (and sleepy) in my hostel in Glasgow, though it took a 30 minute bus ride, several bad directions, and a 20 minute walk to get to.  A very nice man brought me into his home to show me directions on Google Earth, because I was hopelessly lost.  The directions I printed off the SYHA website were wrong, and the bus I was supposed to take didn’t exist on the street it was supposed to exist on.  But after some wandering, and some now bruised shoulder muscles, I’ve made it.

And I even showered.

And I wrote this offline at 22:00, because the wifi costs money, and I don’t get service in my room.   Now, to find food.