For the record; Pawn has flown across the Atlantic 5 times in the past 15 months on United Airlines. Fully 80% of those flights have been delayed by at least an hour, several for 2 or more, due to “Mechanical” problems. Last night’s flight 938 from Chicago O’Hare to London Heathrow was one of these occasions, our 9:20PM departure stretching first to 10, then to 11. I arrived at my London flat in Hoxton at 15:30 rather than 13:00. Oh well.
Pawn occupied himself by Bedazzling his new Samsonite luggage with a likeness of Donald Trump. That should make it stand out on Baggage Reclaim conveyor!
On the bight side, TSA security at O’Hare was a breeze.
The flight was full, or darn close to it. A silent seat partner filled out the port side of row 25. She pressed herself into the window, and I had aisle. I do not believe she got up once during the flight. Upon our descent I expressed envy at her ability to sleep on the flight. “I took an Advil PM,” she replied. “I actually took it too early, turns out, not knowing we’d get delayed 2 hours!”
A few rows behind us was a chatty fellow, who regaled his seat mates, a pair of young lasses from Brighton, with an unending and unsolicited stream of chatter. He sounded like Darren, from Bewitched. The one with the nasally voice and a chin pointy enough to cut glass with. Turns out he looked like him, too.
At one point he went on for quite some time about a photograph he had on his phone, sent from his friend, from a photo shoot said friend had done with Matthew McConaughey, or Matt, to his friends, which apparently included our Darren simulacrum, to hear him tell it. As I listened (and believe me, I had no choice in the matter, none of us sardines did) it dawned on me that I was in the presence of a human lunar eclipse, for like a lunar eclipse is the moon viewed by means of the light of the sun reflected off of the earth and then, in turn, off of the moon itself. This man was basking in the fame of Matt, reflected off of his photographer friend, and finally off of Darren himself.
This stream of prattle went on for hours!! It seemed it would never end. His wife and kids decided to skip London & Berlin, will be meeting him in Italy. He’s staying in Shoreditch, at Hotel M. I wouldn’t be surprised if he inscribed the room number for them, so subtle was his come-on.
The walking, talking, mashing lunar eclipse in row 28 just couldn’t stop.
Made a long, long, long travel day even longer.
Demens Fugit
One charming aspect to the square, which I got to witness after theatre one night, was the formally robed bell ringer whose job it is to sweep through the park at closing time, barring and locking each gate, calling out “One and all, the park is closing” as he rang his bell and moved from gate to gate.