An Engineer Should Never Travel (Or One Should Limit Their Devices!)

I really don't know what has happened!  When I was working in years past and we were planning a trip,  I would most often pack my bag the night before we took off.  Sometimes even the morning of, if you know what I mean.  And, being in real estate, oftentimes I didn't get home until 2 in the morning the night before, so I was a giggly super-tired traveler totally spaced out.  My daughter used to say she was traveling with a "small child", referring to me, so couldn't she board during the early boarding faze.

Now it takes us a week to pack.  And, instead of one or two bags, we left this morning with 4 LARGE bags and two carry-ons.  I told Bos he had to apologize to the car driver BEFORE I would leave the house.  And, frankly, we took with us pretty much our whole house. So, you ask, how could it take you a week to pack?  Well, it was a combination of packing and unpacking and repacking.  And remembering stuff we might need if...  And there were the shoes.  They were a suitcase unto themselves.  What happened to that carefree giggler? Probably forgot to pack her.

Some of what happened is called "being married to an engineer".  He prides himself on planning.  For everything.  Rain. Snow. Hot. Cold. Infections. The epizootic.  Sprained ankles or feet.  Whatever.  And medicine.  Well, medicine is a whole another story.  This old age thing is a logistic problem.  Not only do you have to get the insurance company to okay extra medicine and get the drugstore to get it in time, but you have to pack that same medicine.  And, for six weeks, well, that could ALSO be another suitcase. We look like a traveling Walgreens!

In any case, we took off this morning and flew to Los Angeles to wait a longggg time before we are supposed to get on the Qantas flight to Sydney.  And it was only then that I fully understood what being married to an engineer means.  We had many crises. Now, if you are not an engineer, you might not think you had "crises". You'd go with the flow, so to speak.  But not Bos...

Guy Bos got the newest iPhone from.
The day before departure!

What crises, you ask?  Well, number one crisis is the iPod lost all its music and how, he moans, can we go on vacation without music?  And, although we are stuffed with 2 iPads, an iPhone, an Apple Mac Air, 3 kindles (one just "in case") and my lowly Android phone -- HIS iPad proceeded to freeze up.  Franticness.  Call Apple.  Try to read microscopic numbers on the back to get help.  Success.  IPad back up.  (BTW, who needs 2 (two) iPads  anyway??!) And then, well, the Apple Mac Air needs charging, and one of the 3 (count them - three) kindles needs charging.   And suddenly,  from that mysterious iCloud, the music suddenly appeared on the iPod.  I am getting confused with all the iPad-Pod-Phone stuff.  We even had to take Bos's phone AND his iPad to see if Skype really worked from here.  Engineers.  What can I say... Life for most people used to be so simple...

We are now sitting in the AA lounge, eating chips, drinking wine, plugging in all devices we apparently can't live without.  I have duly lectured Bos on how I hate him and never want to go anywhere with him.  And I'm ready to go home...so, despite everything,  we are off, halfway around the world, engineer and wife, sparring all the way. To Australia.  With all the bugs, sharks, snakes...but more about that in my next post.