South By Southwest*

So on January 9^th our stay in DC came to an end. We had thought we might be able to do more sightseeing in a month's time, but family, grandparenting, Christmas, visits with relatives and friends, helping Rachel and Will with the new house, miserable cold weather (the heralded Arctic Vortex), and the inevitable planning/provisioning/packing, all conspired to limit our travel adventures in Washington. No regrets, however, as we had a great time with all the above. Except the Arctic Vortex.

I did manage to read a bit, Gottfried Wagner's Twilight of the Wagners—Rebecca gave me a copy of Stephen Fry's wonderful Wagner and Me DVD for Christmas—and both The Thin Man and The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hamett. And, oh yes, we saw quite a few movies, The Desolation of Smaug, in preparation for visiting NZ (and LA); and also Cast Away and Blue Lagoon in preparation for visiting to Fiji. Scenery, you know. So Vicki said. Anyhow, we'll be in DC again, no doubt, and can catch up then on the sightseeing.

January 9^th we jetted from National to Atlanta and then to the City of Angels (“I didn't find it to be that exactly, but I'll allow there are some nice folks there...”) and spent the night in the historic (seriously) LAX Travelodge...don't want to miss the next stage of our travels, the January 10^th flight from LA to Fiji and then New Zealand.

Catchya further on down the trail...in Christchurch. Bula bula!

*and AirTrans and Fiji Airways (formerly Air Pacific); the cabin crew on the SW flight was absolutely up to the old standard of hilarity "we're dimming the cabin lights now because we like to go really, really fast in the dark when we take off," etc.