Willem's Planet

We have landed in Johannesburg.  One more leg on my journey to make, to Cape Town.  I cannot write more; I have to run to the gate!

I am at London-Heathrow airport’s Terminal 1, a little bleary-eyed.  It sounds great in theory to have a hotel room to catch a full night’s sleep but then there is jet lag, and rowdy young Icelanders at all hours outside the hotel at a popular all-night hot dog stand.  Were they celebrating the winter solstice? I wondered.  Or just a Friday night celebration?   With the daylight time so short, the distinctions of evening, night time and morning are completely blurred. Even so, I did get a few hours of sleep in a very comfortable bed.  Then at 5 am, I went downstairs to check out and get on the bus that picked me up.

I made it to Sea-Tac airport, and checked in, through security.  I have a flight just under 8 hrs ahead of me to Reykjavik where I will sleep over one night. Then on to London and South Africa.  I get to Reykjavik on just about the shortest day of the year, with the winter solstice upon us. At this time the daylight in Reykjavik lasts all of 4 hrs and 7 mins!  The temperature is around freezing (0°C/ 32°F), so not ‘too cold’.  Still, I picked a hotel in downtown so that I don’t have to venture too far in the cold to see some of the city.

I’m home from Denver .. a crazy day at work it was, squeezing in as much as I can before caught the cab downstairs.  At Seattle airport at 7 pm the cab driver gave me a big smile; he finally made it to the front of the line after he started his shift at 6 pm; so I was his first passenger for the night.  (Man! At least I don’t work the night shift, I thought).  He dropped me at The Chieftain pub on 12th Ave, and in I went luggage and all to join Bryan, Gary, Steve and Ken for their Wednesday night beer, and just to say hi and good-bye to everyone.  I leave for South Africa on Thursday with a stay-over in Reykjavik.

I see the Fed said it would start to taper their bond-buying to $75 billion a month from $85 billion.  And in the waning days of 2013, the US Senate approved a tiny two-person (Paul Ryan and Patti Murray) budget deal.  First time since 2009 the USA actually has an approved budget. There is a ‘doc fix’ in there : postponement of a nearly 24% cut in Medicare pay for physicians from Jan 1 until April 1 – in fact, they get a 0.5% raise during that period.  I guess we have to pay the doctors, right?  But extended unemployment insurance benefits are set to expire December 28, which will leave 1.3 million people without benefits and hit another 800,000 in the coming weeks.  Not good, but for how long should one get unemployment insurance?  More than 6 months?   This budget deal also has military retirees chip in a little bit of their existing benefits.  Is that fair?  Life is full of tough decisions.

It was so nice outside tonight that I went for a walk instead of sitting on the stationary bike in the hotel’s gym. Here are some pictures, of the Colorado Convention Center here in downtown Denver, and of the Denver City and County Building, dressed up in Christmas lighting.

One last Monday to get up early, and then that’s it for 2013, I thought this morning as I got up.  And maybe TSA at Seattle airport knew that : they made me stand in the regular security line today (gasp) : the one where the traveler has to take his/ her computer and liquids out of carry-on bags, and take jacket and shoes off.  (Usually I get to go through the Pre-check line, where that it not needed .. but that designation has to appear on one’s printed boarding pass).  At least it has warmed up really nicely here in Denver.  The forecast calls for temperatures in the 60s here (15+ °C) on Tuesday and Wednesday.

I felt right at home as we arrived into a wet and foggy Seattle tonight. No snow, no ice, and 45°F/ 7°C. My flights from Denver to Seattle are not too long, but sometimes I get ‘cabin fever’ and I cannot wait to arrive so that I can stretch my legs. And gone are the days that there is even one open seat on the plane (at the times of the day that I fly). There have been dramatic changes since the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978 was signed into law.

From Wikipedia : In 2011, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer (who worked with Senator Kennedy on airline deregulation in the 1970s) wrote: What does the industry’s history tell us? Was this effort worthwhile? Certainly it shows that every major reform brings about new, sometimes unforeseen, problems. No one foresaw the industry’s spectacular growth, with the number of air passengers increasing from 207.5 million in 1974 to 721.1 million last year. As a result, no one foresaw the extent to which new bottlenecks would develop: a flight-choked Northeast corridor, overcrowded airports, delays, and terrorist risks consequently making air travel increasingly difficult. Nor did anyone foresee the extent to which change might unfairly harm workers in the industry. Still, fares have come down. Airline revenue per passenger mile has declined from an inflation-adjusted 33.3 cents in 1974, to 13 cents in the first half of 2010. In 1974 the cheapest round-trip New York-Los Angeles flight (in inflation-adjusted dollars) that regulators would allow: $1,442. Today one can fly that same route for $268. That is why the number of travelers has gone way up. So we sit in crowded planes, munch potato chips, flare up when the loudspeaker announces yet another flight delay. But how many now will vote to go back to the “good old days” of paying high, regulated prices for better service?

I made it in to Denver on the very early morning flight.  My colleagues from Dallas had to wait until Monday night to travel out, due to iced-up roads and runways.

From flydenver.com : Cloudscape has been recognized by the Public Art Network as one of the top sculptures installed in 2010. The clouds, which are hollow structures made of corrugated metal and cellular plastic, range in size from 16 to 40 feet, and are mounted on a steel base along the western side of outbound Peña Boulevard to greet people arriving in the Mile High City. Lavery took his inspiration for the sculpture from Colorado’s vivid sky and sunsets.

We get to go home on Thursday nights instead of on Fridays the next few weeks : a welcome change in the travel schedule. The snow had stopped here in Denver by Thursday morning.  It was difficult to get around, though, and took an hour’s drive out to the airport (normally under 30 mins).  The roads are not completely clear of snow and ice, and we left later in the afternoon. Our driver is from Casablanca in Morocco, and speaks his English with a French accent.  (French and Arabic are the major languages in Morocco).

Late Thursday night update :  We thought we were settled in and ready to go, but no. The captain announced that there’s a slight amount of smoke in the cockpit, from some electrical fault.  We’re going to leave the airplane and fine another one.  So we boarded the second plane, but then it still had to be de-iced, which took another 20 minutes (I’m not complaining, I’m just saying!).  It was midnight by the time I made it in.