On The Set Of Modern Family

A strange thing happened after I met Simon Baker. I lost my awe of celebrities. It wasn't that I become jaded or world weary, it's just that, well, I had peaked. I had met my Celebrity Crush, my personal Mr Perfect, my owen Impossible Man, my He Who I Never Thought I'd Meet...

Okay, so maybe enough with the monikers.

My point is this: by the time my family and I visited the set of Modern Family the following week - one of my absolute favorite TV shows (along with Mad Men, 30 Rock and Young Talent Time) - I wasn't nervous at all. Excited, but not nervous. And I liked not feeling nervous. I was, like, totally Hollywood.

We were visiting Modern Family because our friend Michael is one of the directors of the show. (An Emmy winning director, mind you, and my god that statue is heavy).

Me with Mi(chael)'s Emmy

As we drove to Fox to meet him, the kids and my husband and I wondered who we'd get to see.

"Are we going to meet Sofia Vergara's breasts?" The Architect enquired.

"Excuse me?" I asked.

"Are we meeting Sofia Vergara? The one who plays Gloria?"

"You asked if we were meeting her breasts!"

My husband rolled his eyes. "Don't be ridiculous. So are we or not?"

"What?"

"Meeting her breasts?"

Yup.

We arrived at the lot at 10am and were greeted by Rachael, the delightful production assistant assigned to shlep us around in a golf buggy and fetch us donuts whenever we were hungry.

And just in case you didn't read that the first time, we had a production assistant assigned to shlep us around the lot in a golf buggy and fetch us donuts whenever we were hungry. I may be comfortable around celebrities now, but my god that gave me a thrill.

We were shown onto the Modern Family set, and it looked exactly like it did on TV, which probably shouldn't have come as a surprise to someone as Hollywood as me. Though the rooms had no ceilings, they were completely enclosed, with four walls and doors and furniture. We posed for photos on the iconic couches in which the characters are 'interviewed', and examined the contents of the prop fridges and cupboards. My son was delighted to find real food in the refrigerator, and if I hadn't been such an old hand at visiting sets, I may have been a little delighted too.

On Jay & Gloria's couch

We watched some filming, a scene involving Claire (Julie Bowen) and Phil (Ty Burrell) and their daughter Haley (Sarah Hyland) and suddenly all my Hollywood coolness fell away. They were incredible. The scene was reshot at least eight or nine times, and every single time the actors' nuances were detailed, their performances were subtly different, and the scene was as freshly hilarious as it was the first time. They deserved every Emmy they have won and I was awed.

For a painful moment, I wished desperately I had not given up my promising career as an actress. And then, for an even more painful moment, I remembered how crap I had been, and how the only award I would possibly have won would have been Waitress of the Month (and as I'm clumsy, impatient and rude, it's doubtful I even would have won that).

Sarah Hyland & Ty Burrell & me

After the filming, Rachael took us on a tour of the Fox lot like the VIPs we (wished desperately we) were. Then we chugged back to the set, and met several cast members, which, had I not been so used to meeting big celebrities, might have given me a bit of a thrill.

Rico Rodriguez II

The kids of the show were all absolutely divine - poised and confident and polite and friendly - just like Boo is in my dreams of the future. Ty Burrell and Eric Stonestreet (who plays Cameron) were warm and approachable. And Julie Bowen was hilarious, cracking jokes, talking a million miles an hour, and taking it upon herself to plait Boo's hair and interview Boo about her special blanky. (It turns out, much to my surprise, that the blanky is a 'boy', and cannot turn into a girl because it is not a 'magic blanky'. I did not know this.)

Me & Eric Stonestreet

Sadly, we did not get to meet Jesse Tyler Ferguson, who plays Mitchell brilliantly, or Ed O'Neill, who I have worshipped ever since his days in 'Married... With Children'. And even more sadly for The Architect, we did not get to meet Sofia Vergara's breasts, or even Sofia Vergara herself.

The Architect was crushed, and for that I am sorry, by my god I was relieved.

Julie Bowen

All in all, it was a very pleasant day.

And if I wasn't so totally Hollywood, I might say it was bloody awesome.

Wish Me Luck As You Wave Me Goodbye....

Tomorrow I am leaving on a fearsome adventure. I am travelling to a place filled with peril, a place fraught with danger, a place known to strike fear into the heart of even the most stalwart of human beings.

Disneyland.

I am not taking this journey alone. I am traveling with my husband The Architect and our three children (mainly because they insisted on going; I think it would be way easier to travel to Disneyland without them, though possibly there wouldn't be as much point).

What's worse, we are traveling by air. I am terrified of flying with kids. It's not that I'm scared of flying - I quite like an airplane trip when I'm by myself (particularly those cute little meals served in the plastic trays with all the compartments) - but put me on a plane with my kids and I fall apart. I agonize about it for weeks before we leave. How am I going to entertain them? What if their ears hurt? What if they vomit? What if they don't sleep? What if I don't sleep? What if I sleep and they wake me up? What if they sleep on me and I lose circulation and my legs fall off when I stand up? And, worst of all, how hideously awful am I going to feel when we get there, and I have to look after three exhausted children whilst wanting to curl into a ball and die quietly alone in a hotel room???

I know the trip is only a few (dozen) hours and it will be worth it when I get there. But the flight will be repulsive in the extreme, and whilst I could try not think about it until we board the plane, that would be a total waste of angst. So I am torturing myself thoroughly with visions of the horror, and will continue to do so until we have completed are holiday and are safely back home again. Because that's just what I do.

In the meantime, I have been making preparations - packing, buying every possible pharmaceutical item we could need on our trip (because obviously they don't have pharmacies in the United States), organizing a house/Spunky sitter, and giving copies of my passport and life insurance policies to friends in case of accident or misadventure overseas (you know, like getting trampled by Mickey Mouse or hit by a flying roller coaster or being bored to death in a four hour queue).

So if you don't hear from me for a couple of weeks, do not fear. I am having the time of my life with my kids in the Scariest Happiest Place On Earth.

Either that or I am trapped under Donald Duck, flailing helplessly, a chilli dog wedged in my mouth, and cotton candy clenched in each fist.

Either way, I'll have a lot to tell you upon my return.

Happy New Year everyone, and lots of love to you all.

Flying And Punishment

Those of you who read my blog regularly will know that I have recently returned from the United States. Those of you who don’t read my blog regularly really should. It’s very funny and it will make your hair lush and your skin glow (which isn’t true, but I can promise you that it definitely won’t hurt).

I had a wonderful time overseas but have been paying the price since I returned home. For one thing, I got my Visa bill, which gave me an immediate panic attack, and caused me to reach, shaking, for the Valium. Unfortunately, though, I had already taken my last Valium, when I had woken in a claustrophobic panic in our terrifyingly miniscule hotel room in New York, and had to either calm myself down pharmaceutically, or run to Central Park in my pyjamas.

(I did consider going to Central park, but a) according to Simon and Garfunkel you should not wander there after dark, and b) despite the streets being numbered, I wasn’t at all sure I could find it without my map. And I couldn’t find my map because it was night time.)

I truly hadn’t realised how much money we were spending in America because it was all so very cheap. I mean, how can you resist buying a top for US$60 which has been marked down from US$400, and works out to be more like AUS$55 after the conversion?

What I failed to grasp, of course, is that the US$60 is before tax, so that the final price is closer to US$70, which is over AUS$60. And what I also failed to grasp is that $60 is still $60, and works out to be more like $6000 when you spend it a hundred times. Still, I certainly grasp that now.

Since arriving back in Australia, I have also been paying an emotional price. Now, I’m not talking about jetlag, although it is most inconvenient to have to drop everything at lunchtime each day and sleep for a couple of hours (not to mention unpleasant for my kids, who are picked up by a mummy whose skin is pale and grey and who is drooling from the side of her mouth).

I’m talking about guilt.


Not my child. But a good likeness.



We went to the States without our three children, because – although we were desperate to take them with us – our work commitments precluded it. (And if you believe that, you’ll believe that my blog makes your hair lush, because we really just wanted to go alone.)

My kids were well looked after by their grandparents and babysitter, and behaved beautifully the whole time we were away. And the two older kids have been wonderful since we’ve been back, no doubt because they missed us terribly, although it may also have had something to do with their numerous gifts, also known as ‘Any excuse to visit the M&M store’.

Three year old Boo, on the other hand, has been rather less wonderful. Though she insists that she is ‘very happy’ to have us home, she has expressed this joy rather oddly, by crying when I don’t give her six chocolate wafers, crying when I pay attention to her siblings, and crying when asked to do a wee. Apparently, this is known as ‘punishing us for going away’.

As if the Visa bill wasn’t punishment enough.

An Australian Girl In America: Flying High

So we fly to Los Angeles on Sunday night and head straight to our friend Jack's 30th* birthday party. By the time we got to bed it was a conservative 12pm Los Angeles time, but 4am New York time, and I was delirious with exhaustion (and, er, alcohol).

The next day our flight was scheduled to leave at 10.15pm, by which time I was already about four hours past my need to crash*.

We arrived at LAX nice and early for our flight, and attempted to check in with V Australia at Terminal 1. The man behind the counter (labelled with 'Warning: This area contains carcinogenic chemicals' - you know, as it does...) cheerily told us the flight had been cancelled and that we must proceed to Air New Zealand in Terminal 2.

Well, Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 may only be adjacent, but they are bloody big terminals, and it was the equivalent of shlepping two ginormous suitcases from Sydney to Newcastle***.

We waited in line at Air New Zealand and were finally served by another man behind another counter which apparently also contained carcinogenic chemicals. He didn't seem fussed by the cancer risk, but he also didn't seem to have any idea where we could sit on the replacement flight or indeed if we were sitting at all.

And then it became a flat bed.....

After protracted exchanges, a clever-looking man in a dapper beard and a 'Team Leader' badge approached and I clung to him like a woman on a trek from Sydney to Newcastle clings to her water bottle.

'Please help to sort this out,' I begged him. 'I'm tired and I need to go home to my kids.'

And then I wept, just a little.

Within five minutes we were all sorted, we were seated on the 11.30pm flight to Sydney, and we were in Business Class, and I hugged my Team Leader like he was Simon Baker. He seemed unfussed.

We started boarding the plane at 10.30pm, except it wasn't a plane, it was a bus driving us to the plane, and I swear it took so long to get there I thought we were actually driving to Australia (though perhaps a ferry would take us over the troublesome water bit).

We finally boarded the actual plane at about 11.15pm, and then sat there for quite a while, during which time I delightedly (and deliriously) examined my Business Class box of goodies, which included cosmetics, toothbrush, eye mask, and some rather fashion-forward candy striped socks.

At 12.15pm we finally took off. I tossed back my complimentary champagne, donned my candy striped socks, converted my enormous seat into a flat bed, slipped on my eye mask, and cuddled under my doona like the Business Class princess I was.

I slept soundly for a bit, then stumbled out in a confused haze to go to the toilet (which was spacious and smelled like roses).

'Can you sell me the dime?' I slurred to the nearest flight attendant.

He looked at his watch. 'It's 2.20am,' he told me.

'Oh, tho we've been in de air for doo hours?' I asked.

'No,' he said carefully, clearly making a mental note not to serve me more alcohol. 'We've been in the air for nine hours.'

And suddenly, I was wide awake and happy as Larry****.

I spent the rest of the flight watching movies (Morning Glory, which was hilarious, and Black Swan, which most definitely was not), eating every course of the magnificent breakfast, and generally feeling delighted.

And we landed in Sydney, where we caught a cab back home to a beautiful Welcome Home sign from my kids, and real life began once more.

And it isn't Business Class. But it's mine.

*using '30th' in the sense of '50th'.
**'crash' as in 'sleep'; not crash as in 'plane crash', I would never have a need for that.
***okay, so perhaps not that bad, but I was exhausted and hungover and really cranky, and it felt very long.
****or at least, happy as my husband, who looked pretty damn comfortable in his flat bed.

An Australian Girl In America: The Safe Word

So today was a real downer. My husband used the Safe word. You know the Safe word? When you're having kinky sex you agree on a Safe word, which when used by either party will bring an immediate halt to the proceedings.

Thing is, though, our Safe word wasn't related to sex. It was related to shopping. My husband used it, and now I have to stop.*

Other than my husband spoiling all my fun (I mean, I've only bought three pairs of pants, three dresses, six tops, a jacket, four pairs of shoes, five rings and a ton of cosmetics - really, I'm just getting started) it's been a wild couple of days.

For a start, I saw squirrels. I like squirrels. They have cute bushy tails and run up trees and are almost as special as koalas. But not quite, obviously. You can't cuddle a squirrel. (And I know that technically you shouldn't cuddle a koala either as they scratch and bite, but Americans don't know that.)

I ate at a gorgeous restaurant, which served little 'tasters' before each course. The one before entree (which is a 'starter' here) was this gorgeous cheesy puffy thing. The one before dessert, however, was granola with yoghurt. Not some 'interpretation' of granola and yoghurt; just granola and yoghurt. This is a seriously weird town.

I ate breakfast at a diner and was served fried potatos with my omelette. I love potatos. I could eat potatos with every meal. I reckon I could even eat potatos before dessert. It would be a damn sight more appropriate than granola, anyway.

I walked for hours and hours around Manhatten, without a scrap of make-up, without ever bumping into anyone I have ever known. I can be anonymous here in NY, unlike in Sydney, where I am constantly bumping into people I know. Like my kids. And my mum.

I visited the Lego shop, which was amazing. There were individual nooks for every colour and shape piece of Lego every invented (which may be a slight exaggeration, but only slight). My husband and I custom made Lego mini-figures for each of our kids, and it was one of the most fun things I'd ever done. Which is probably a pretty sad reflection of my life, but the truth nonetheless.

I shopped, an insane amount. Of course, I only bought things I really needed; I just didn't know that I needed them until I bought them. But travelling is all about discovery, right?

Oh, and I bought bandaids for the blisters on my feet, which was kind of hard to do, due to the cultural differences.

"I need bandaids," I told my husband. "What are they called here?"

"Um... plasters? Sticking plasters?" he told me.

"I need sticking plasters," I told the cashier at the pharmacy.

"Pasta?" the pharmacist asked. "You want pasta?"

"Plasters!" I told him. "For my feet!"

He looked blank.

"Blisters!" I said. "Look! I have blisters! I need to cover them up!"

"You don't want Bandaids?" he asked. And I paid and slunk out in shame.

Tomorrow we head back to LA, and then it's time for home. But I'll miss New York. I heart NY. Which is a really lame thing to say, but I'm anonymous here, so I can be as lame as I want.

*and for those who were wondering, the Safe word was 'MortgageDefault'. But seriously, mortgage shmortgage. We're in New York!!!

An Australian Girl In America: NEW YORK

Some of you may have noticed that I ceased blogging about my American holiday at Day 3, and have not updated it since we arrived in New York. This is not because I am lazy or do not have access to the internet or have lost my mojo or have had my fingers amputated in a horrific subway accident. It simply means that I have been too busy shopping and eating cheesecake brownie icecream to write.

For this, I apologise. And I shall attempt to make amends with this comprehensive guide to All I Have Done In New York (which is actually only Some Of What I Have Done In New York, but I have shopping to do and cheesecake brownie icecream to eat, so it will have to do):


The room. The WHOLE room.



1. I have stayed in a hotel room the size of my bathroom at home. And it's not an especially big bathroom. Seriously. I have to climb over the bed to access the toilet. And when I do sit on the toilet, my knees bump up against the wall. Luckily, however, the room comes with an enormous balcony, so we don't get too claustrophobic. Oh, except it doesn't.

2. I have visited pretty much every Bloomingdales, H&M, Gap, Macy's, and *insert name of every American chain store and unique shop in NYC* in NYC. I have walked into each one, laughed out loud at the delightfully low prices, and walked out with a bag of something unreal. And then I've carried it back to the teeny weeny hotel, laid it out on the bed, and sighed with happiness.

3. I have nearly got run over about 25 times as I keep looking for traffic on the right side of the road, which here, unfortunately, is wrong. If you know what I mean.

4. I have tried to drink diet Cherry Coke. I failed.

5. I have perfected my Starbucks order, as drinking Starbucks is a necessity in this town that never sleeps, but has never, in all the years it has been awake, learned to make great coffee. For the record, my order is Full Fat Double Shot Grande Coffee Frappucino. It gets me through the day.

6. I have seen a beggar chatting animatedly on a mobile phone, and another with an iPod.


Yum Yum



7. I have seen Whole Pig Butt on a menu. I declined to order it.



8. I have sat at a table with a New York woman who spent 15 minutes instructing the waiter on how to prepare her meal without dairy or wheat as she is severely wheat and lactose intolerant. After eating her fish, she ate a slice of her friend's double-cheese pizza. I am not kidding.


Someone's idea of heaven. Not mine.



9. I have watched my husband buy chocolate-covered bacon. My response to it was much the same as my response to the Whole Pig Butt. I suspect the taste was too.

10. I have sat down at a window in a diner alone for 5 minutes and been approached by some crazy dude in a silk shirt and giant silver ring who announced that he and his 'special lady' have an arrangement and that he would like to make love to me. See responses to Pig Butt and choc-covered bacon.

11. I have felt dirtier than I have ever felt in my life. It's like a film of grot settles on me  from the moment I leave the hotel until the moment I get back in the shower. New York in summer is steamy and smelly and grimy. But there is soap and there is water and there is H&M and cheesecake brownie icrecream so who the hell cares?

12. I have said 'Ya' several times a day, every day. It is the American version of 'Yeah', and it is catchy and contagious and I love it and am going to take it back home. You don't think I'm serious? Well YA. I am

13. I have missed my kids. Crazily. And however fabulous NY is, I cannot wait to get back home and see them again.

An Australian Girl In America: Day 3

So Sunday morning we woke up at 12.22pm, which wasn't actually morning, when you come to think of it. We had been up partying with our LA friends till about 1.15am, and then decided not to bother being awake again for a long, long time.

When I finally regained consciousness I went to the mini-bar looking for coffee. There was none. There were, however, sleeping pills on sale for US$6, which was hardly what I needed, but a charming metaphor for the paradox that is the USA.

I wandered down to the diner beneath the hotel, and ordered an espresso. While I was waiting, I chatted to the waitress, a cute brunette in a pink diner uniform - you know, one of those nurse's style dresses buttoned up at the front with an apron around her waist (seriously, they actually wear those).

"Were you born here in LA?" I asked.

"No, I'm from Colorado," she answered.

"Why did you come here?" I asked.

"I came here to be an actress," she said. And my heart cracked a little for her broken dreams.

Fueled by coffee, I collected my husband and we proceeded to lunch with our friends to a lovely Italian bistro. My focacccia was very similar to an Australian focaccia, except that instead of being the size of, say, a small plate, it was the size of my daughter. Not my 3 year old daughter, either. My 10 year old daughter. Wearing platform heels and a hat.

After lunch, we browsed through the markets on Melrose (yes, the one from TV) and looked in some super funky shops that were far too super funky for a mother-of-three with stretch marks and saggy boobs. My husband tried on some retro 50's style shirts, which made him look like a tragic, try-hard, shrunken version of Charlie Sheen - unsurprising, given that the shirt labels read 'Charlie Sheen style'. I had to forcibly wrestle them out of his hands, much like he had to wrestle the seventeen pairs of silver sandals from mine. Except that my silver sandals looked GOOD.

That night we went with our friends Jack and Rhonda* to a majorly hip LA restaurant. I was very excited to see a super famous black dude in a fedora sitting with his back to the wall, and was crushed to realise that he wasn't famous at all; he was just a black dude in a fedora. I guess I assumed that to be bold enough to wear a fedora, you have to have something.

I ordered a chocolate dessert, which contained layers of different, geometrically shaped chocolatey things, including what looked like a large chocolate licorice bullet on a very fine straw.

"Do I eat it?" I asked Rhonda.

"Yes, you bite it!" she said. Well thanks a lot RHONDA, because I bit the bullet, which turned out to be some sort of plastic receptacle. The bullet shot a fine spray of molten chocolate through the straw and all over my pants and the table. Turns out you were meant to suck it. Bloody LA fancy pants restaurant.

We returned to our hotel and collapsed into bed. Tomorrow was another day, and we were leaving for NY, and god knows what molten adventures awaited us there.

*Not their real names, and Rhonda is most displeased with the pseudonym I chose for her. So if you prefer to think of her as 'Lolita' or 'Mirabella' or 'Aloicia' please do.

An Australian Girl In America: Days 1 & 2

So we arrived at our hotel in LA at 10am (3am Australian time) after our long haul flight during which I may or may not have combined pills and alchohol (see previous blog). My husband and I immediately fell into deep sleeps (read 'comatose states') from which we awoke five hours later refreshed and rejuvenated (read 'jetlagged and feeling revolting'). We decided to get out and into the sun (read 'shop') so left our hotel and walked to the nearest shopping centre (read 'caught a taxi'). We were near Beverley Hills, and so the clothes were prohibitively expensive, but I still managed to find some sale bargains and bought a few items (read 'lots').

We were both hungry so we hit the diner scene for some food. It was a day of culinary firsts for me. I broke my chilli cheese fries cherry, and then I broke my cherry pie cherry (I am SO proud of that line. Let's say it again, shall we? 'I broke my cherry pie cherry'. Ah......)

The chilli cheese fries tasted great while I was eating it and then horrible five minutes later. The cherry pie tasted great fullstop, until I saw apple pie on the menu, and noticed that 'added melted cheese' was an additional $1.95. I was nauseated, and let me tell you, it wasn't because of the cost of the cheese. It was because of the concept. I mean, apple pie with cheese? Have some dignity, Americans!

We returned to our hotel, and discovered a girl in undies lying in a glass box behind the front desk. She had her back turned to us, so I assumed she was cranky, and didn't knock on the glass, despite being hugely tempted. I asked if perhaps I could be paid to lie in the glass box for the next couple of days, but my offer was politely declined (read 'declined with a look of horror').

And then we went to bed.

This morning we awoke and headed to meet our LA friends. We hopped in a taxi which was driven by a very angry Bulgarian, who abused us all the way there, claiming we were making him drive to another city, we didn't know what we were talking about (even though all we'd said was the address) and were grossly inconveniencing him. The ride took twenty minutes.

We ate at a very posh cafe which we were assured by excellent sources is frequented by Simon Baker. To my profound disappointment, Simon was not there, and the only other patron in the cafe was Steven Spielberg. Bummer.

I tried to photograph Steven but my friend Jack's* big head was in the way, so Jack's wife Rhonda took the photo for me. She was not pleased, as apparently it is 'very uncool' to photograph celebrities in LA, but I threatened to cry unless she did. So she took the picture as discreetly as she could, which turned out not to be very discreet as all as the flash went off on her iPhone. She then slunk in her chair  muttering 'I'm so humiliated' for the next half hour, whilst I waved and tried to make eye contact with Steve.

My friends had business to attend to so my husband and I did another spot of shopping, during which time I picked up this important self help manual for him. Honestly, I don't know how we've survived so long without it.

We then proceeded to Venice Beach, which was just like Bondi Beach, only virtually everyone there was at least one of the following:

1. Black
2. Exceedingly well built
3. Obese
4. Covered head to toe in tattoos
5. Covered head to toe in gold jewellery
6. Eating a chilli cheese dog
7. On rollerblades.

Being none of the above, we stood out like sore thumbs. This is probably why I was chosen by two performing artists to dance with them. And because I'm on holidays and no-one will ever see the evidence, I did.

Later, dudes.

*Names changed in case Steven Spielberg reads this post.

An Australian Girl In America: Day Zero

I arrived at the international airport on Friday morning with high hopes (that I had actually packed the right things in my suitcase). My husband and I checked in, went through customs, and then proceeded directly to the bookshop to check on the placement of my book (which, to be honest, was really the purpose of my trip – after all, you can’t visit the international airport bookshop without a boarding pass).


The book was placed appropriately and I took the opportunity to tell the salesman how utterly fantastic it was and that he should recommend it to all his customers. He seemed both unconvinced and unimpressed (his exact words being ‘Well, whatever rocks your boat) but I felt secure in the knowledge that he would not recognize me as the author, given that my makeup-free, eye-bag ridden* face bore no resemblance whatsoever to the glowing, heavily made-up woman on the cover.

After an hour delay (during which I didn’t pace or worry the plane was never going to take off) we entered the aircraft and took our seats. I immediately began investigating the on-board entertainment system, which was comprehensive indeed. I watched several episodes of ‘How I Met Your Mother’ before I began to experience difficulties. You see, the high-quality headphones were simply too small for my gigantic ears, and my ear-flaps were aching where they had to be folded back to fit.

Yes, like severely obese people who require two seats on a plane to accommodate their girth, I require special, giant-sized headphones to accommodate my ears. And the airline did not supply them. A clear example of discrimination.

In despair, I decided just to have a glass of wine and a sleeping pill and go to sleep (despite it being only 1pm Australian time). I ordered some red wine with my lunch and drank it all in a big gulp. Unfortunately, though I ordered red wine with my lunch, it actually arrived before my lunch, and I drank it on an empty stomach. With a sleeping pill. So by the time my lunch arrived, I had pretty much lost control of my limbs, and knocked the empty glass on the floor, shattering it into a thousand pieces. As the flight attendant picked it off the floor, I tried to offer to help, before realizing I couldn’t really speak properly, and focused on carefully eating my lamb-something-messy before lying comatose in my seat.

I awoke two hours later feeling remarkably refreshed and rejuvenated. At least, that’s what I thought, until I got up to go to the toilet and found I had troubles walking down the aisle. When I returned to my seat I asked my husband ‘What is time now confused?’, thought ‘That doesn’t sound right,’ then explained ‘I don’t think had enough tired still sleep’.

I lay down again for ten minutes, then suddenly felt much better. Except it turns out it wasn’t ten minutes at all. It was two and a half hours, and the trip was nearly over.

If you call ‘six hours of flying time left’ nearly over. Which I didn’t.

And I longingly eyed the sleeping pills…

Nearly Gone...

So tomorrow I leave for the States, and I feel I am just about ready to go. I have written a checklist, rewritten it, lost it, written it again, rewritten it, and ticked most of the items off.

And I'm proud. When I consider what it has taken to get me on that plane tomorrow morning, sans children, I feel an enormous sense of achievement. Enormous enough to justify the generous amount of alcohol I plan to consume on the flight, in the hopes of drowning out the guilt I feel about leaving my kids behind.

So with tears in my eyes, and a vision of Cab Sav in a plastic cup in my mind, here is my checklist:

• Write list of items to pack in suitcase.
• Pack items on list.
• Realise half the items on the list are completely inappropriate, and remove from suitcase.
• Repack suitcase.
• Repeat previous step several times.
• Pour all cosmetics into tiny little bottles to take on the plane.
• Wipe massive spills from numerous tiny little bottles and shudder at the wasted money (see previous blog post on Clinique).
• Cuddle my kids.
• Write extensive lists for my parents and the babysitter regarding kids' schedules, meal preferences and 'treat' allowances.
• Panic about leaving my kids.
• Cuddle my kids.
• Get pedicure.
• Shave legs.
• Become temporarily blinded by dazzling whiteness of legs.
• Attempt to lose three kilos as everyone in LA and NY is really skinny.
• Gain two kilos as a result of failed diet attempt.
• Decide everyone in LA and NY will have to love me for my intellect.
• Buy four big books for the flight (one to read, one spare, and two extra in case either of the first are really crap).
• Buy special 'facial rehydration mist' to spray on face during flight (knowing full well it is just fancy shmancy water).
• Go to doctor to get script for sleeping pills.
• Go to chemist to fill script for sleeping pills.
• Ask chemist what the maximum dose of sleeping pills is.
• Argue with chemist about what the maximum safe dose of sleeping pills really is.
• Ask my husband 17000 times if he has booked the flights and hotel.
• Discover 48 hours before we leave that one of the flights is wrong.
• Discover 24 hours before the flight that I'd forgotten to arrange travel insurance.
• Fix flight and buy insurance.
• Criticise husband for nearly stuffing up flight. Neglect to inform husband I nearly stuffed up insurance.
• Cuddle my children.
• Buy combination locks for suitcases.
• Spend an hour trying to figure out how to use combination locks for suitcases.
• Collect recommendations from friends about where to go / eat / shop in NY. Currently we would have to stay in NY for around a year and a half to get to all the places.
• Cuddle my children.
• Leave.

And so far, I've done everything but the last. But I intend to do that tomorrow morning.

Speak to you from the United States, people!