back in the states.

The flight to the US wasn't bad, I had stayed up partying till 7:30am and gotten 2 hours of sleep the night before. My plan was to be as tired as possible and sleep through the whole 14 hour flight. Just in case, I had some sleeping pills that a friend had given me. I popped them in line for the security checkpoint, an hour and a half before time to board my flight.

45 minutes later they were hitting me hard. I was ready to pass out sitting at the gate, waiting to board. I tried my damndest to stay awake, spying on people's passports, curious where everyone was from. There were some Aussies and Americans of course, but also a good amount of Chinese citizens and Germans. I talked to a few people about where they were going, and finally heard the much awaited words:

"Quantas Flight 73 is now boarding unaccompanied children, people with strollers and other priority travellers at Gate 9"

A few minutes later it was my turn to get in line I stumbled to the gate and handed in my ticket. All of the questions I was asked were answered in grunts and gestures. I was waved through, found my way to my seat, cursed the people who had used all the overhead storage space, jammed my camera in as best as possible, sat down and was out cold.

A few hours into the flight and I was awoken as the dinner cart passed. "Beef or chicken sir?"

"uhhh.." I was still pretty groggy. "uh, beef?"

suddenly there was a dish in front of me. Black bottom, red top, a few little cups (one full of salad, the other two empty) red foil covered hot plates. a thin plastic bag held plastic cutlery, salt, pepper, sugar and a napkin. There was a mint.

I ate the food, unsure exactly what it was, then tried to get back to sleep. The food kept me awake, I held my eyes shut, but still couldn't doze off and eventually gave up. A flight attendant walked by and I asked for a glass of whiskey (complimentary... score!) which I drank while watching a few episodes of The Simpsons, finally falling asleep to the classics.

A few more hours of sleep and I woke back up, still groggy but unable to sleep. I ordered more whiskey and watched a few movies.

I passed the time watching art flicks and finally landed in San Francisco.

From the airport, off to the De Young museum to see the King Tut exhibit with all kinds of artefacts from his tomb. The ancient relics got me thinking about all sorts of things...

A few days in Sacramento visiting friends and a quick jaunt up to Humboldt County and back. The drive was great, a fast way (6 hours each direction) to reconnect with California and wrap my head around all that I'd seen in two months in Australia.

No its time to figure out my next move. I have lots of projects I thought up recently that I'd like to start implementing and lots of choices of what to do with myself now.