Zone Times!
The holiday is over. It all feels strange right now, as if it were just a wonderful dream I woke up from. Maybe it's the jet lag.
The return flight was all right. I slept on the plane from Austin to San Francisco pretty much the entire time. I missed the last beverage service, which was too bad; I was pretty darn thirsty.
Upon arriving at San Francisco International Airport, I had to visit the Japan Airlines ticket counter to get my boarding pass for the trans-Pacific leg of the journey. At Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, the United Airlines Hag (she was a very aged and cranky woman) had only given me the pass from AUS to SFO. It wasn't much of a hassle in the end, and both security checks were completed quickly and smoothly. Well, the first check at AUS was a bit longer, because the TSA agent looking at my carry-on luggage via x-ray didn't know what to make of the motherboard. She thought it was a projector. Learning from that experience, I decided to take the motherboard out of my carry-on bag when going through security at SFO.
The flight was much less turbulent than my America-bound flight. I finally got the chance to see The Bourne Ultimatum. I had to watch it twice, since the first time around the last 40 minutes or so were inexplicably jumpy, skippy, and all-around not happy. Too many packets lost or something. The second time was perfectly fine, with no jumps, skips, nor unhappies. I also watched some of Rush Hour 3 with little interest. Meet the Robinsons was a fantastically ridiculous movie. I'm not sure what to make of it now. The Shawshank Redemption (ショーシャンクの空に in Japanese for some reason) was also showing, so I watched bits of it here and there. It is still as good as the first, second, and probably third time I've seen it.
A neat feature of this flight was that the personal movie screen had a menu from which to choose one's inflight entertainment. The movies section listed all the movies and languages they were available in, plus it also showed the time (in minutes) until the movie started over again. This feature was very convenient, taking away all the guesswork and mental math needed on my America-bound flight. I almost spoiled The Bourne Ultimatum about fifteen times then.
The flight arrived at 成田国際空港 30 minutes ahead of schedule, making everyone very happy. I was able to clear customs very quickly and get my baggage within 10 minutes as well, making me very very happy. I had no trouble buying my Narita Express ticket to Yokohama, and the wait for the train wasn't so bad. All this good fortune had to be balanced out, right?
It sure was. Upon arriving at Yokohama station, I discovered that my luggage was missing. All my clothes, underwear, and some of my Christmas presents were in that suitcase. I managed to tell a conductor about my problem, and he told me that someone probably took my bag by mistake (my guess as well). As luck would have it, someone had gotten off at Shinagawa station (one station prior) with my bag, forgetting his own two bags somehow in the process. I ended up having to wait about 30 minutes for him to bring my luggage. As an apology, he also gave me 2000 yen, which was nice. I ended up using part of it to take a taxi home from Kuji station. More on that mini-adventure later.
While waiting for him and my bag, my helpful conductor (Mr. Nakamura, but I don't think his first name was Hiro, nor could he bend space and time) remarked that he had no idea how a person could mistake one black bag for a green bag and navy blue bag. First of all, the colors are slightly different. Second (and most importantly), he had two bags, not one bag. I smiled a bit at Mr. Nakamura's remark.
Anyway, that was cleared up in fine order. I took the remaining two trains back to Kuji station without much hassle. My suitcase was heavy, though, and Kuji station has neither escalators nor elevators, so I burned off all my holiday calories there. Crossing an ocean and carrying a heavy suitcase up and down stairs makes a body tired, so I decided to see if I could catch a taxi. Fortune smiled, and a taxi miraculously pulled up near the station. I told him the general area I wanted to go to, and he welcomed my business. Fortune laughed again (not as good as the smiling), and suddenly my taxi driver lost his hearing or something. As I gave directions on where and when to turn, he never heard me until we were nearly past the turn. I was all like, "WTF!?" so I had him drop me off about halfway to the apartment. Easiest 710 yen he made, I bet. I finally got home just past 9PM Japan time, making my journey (from leaving my accomodation in Austin to arriving at my apartment door in Japan) just about 24 hours.
The day after I got back (today) was a work day, but it was shorter than usual because there was seriously nothing to do. The Big Boss called it a day an hour earlier than normal. This was surprising, because we also started the work day an hour later than normal. Ah well. It's the weekend again as well. I'm going to do so much sleeping, hopefully helping to retune my biological clock.
The return flight was all right. I slept on the plane from Austin to San Francisco pretty much the entire time. I missed the last beverage service, which was too bad; I was pretty darn thirsty.
Upon arriving at San Francisco International Airport, I had to visit the Japan Airlines ticket counter to get my boarding pass for the trans-Pacific leg of the journey. At Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, the United Airlines Hag (she was a very aged and cranky woman) had only given me the pass from AUS to SFO. It wasn't much of a hassle in the end, and both security checks were completed quickly and smoothly. Well, the first check at AUS was a bit longer, because the TSA agent looking at my carry-on luggage via x-ray didn't know what to make of the motherboard. She thought it was a projector. Learning from that experience, I decided to take the motherboard out of my carry-on bag when going through security at SFO.
The flight was much less turbulent than my America-bound flight. I finally got the chance to see The Bourne Ultimatum. I had to watch it twice, since the first time around the last 40 minutes or so were inexplicably jumpy, skippy, and all-around not happy. Too many packets lost or something. The second time was perfectly fine, with no jumps, skips, nor unhappies. I also watched some of Rush Hour 3 with little interest. Meet the Robinsons was a fantastically ridiculous movie. I'm not sure what to make of it now. The Shawshank Redemption (ショーシャンクの空に in Japanese for some reason) was also showing, so I watched bits of it here and there. It is still as good as the first, second, and probably third time I've seen it.
A neat feature of this flight was that the personal movie screen had a menu from which to choose one's inflight entertainment. The movies section listed all the movies and languages they were available in, plus it also showed the time (in minutes) until the movie started over again. This feature was very convenient, taking away all the guesswork and mental math needed on my America-bound flight. I almost spoiled The Bourne Ultimatum about fifteen times then.
The flight arrived at 成田国際空港 30 minutes ahead of schedule, making everyone very happy. I was able to clear customs very quickly and get my baggage within 10 minutes as well, making me very very happy. I had no trouble buying my Narita Express ticket to Yokohama, and the wait for the train wasn't so bad. All this good fortune had to be balanced out, right?
It sure was. Upon arriving at Yokohama station, I discovered that my luggage was missing. All my clothes, underwear, and some of my Christmas presents were in that suitcase. I managed to tell a conductor about my problem, and he told me that someone probably took my bag by mistake (my guess as well). As luck would have it, someone had gotten off at Shinagawa station (one station prior) with my bag, forgetting his own two bags somehow in the process. I ended up having to wait about 30 minutes for him to bring my luggage. As an apology, he also gave me 2000 yen, which was nice. I ended up using part of it to take a taxi home from Kuji station. More on that mini-adventure later.
While waiting for him and my bag, my helpful conductor (Mr. Nakamura, but I don't think his first name was Hiro, nor could he bend space and time) remarked that he had no idea how a person could mistake one black bag for a green bag and navy blue bag. First of all, the colors are slightly different. Second (and most importantly), he had two bags, not one bag. I smiled a bit at Mr. Nakamura's remark.
Anyway, that was cleared up in fine order. I took the remaining two trains back to Kuji station without much hassle. My suitcase was heavy, though, and Kuji station has neither escalators nor elevators, so I burned off all my holiday calories there. Crossing an ocean and carrying a heavy suitcase up and down stairs makes a body tired, so I decided to see if I could catch a taxi. Fortune smiled, and a taxi miraculously pulled up near the station. I told him the general area I wanted to go to, and he welcomed my business. Fortune laughed again (not as good as the smiling), and suddenly my taxi driver lost his hearing or something. As I gave directions on where and when to turn, he never heard me until we were nearly past the turn. I was all like, "WTF!?" so I had him drop me off about halfway to the apartment. Easiest 710 yen he made, I bet. I finally got home just past 9PM Japan time, making my journey (from leaving my accomodation in Austin to arriving at my apartment door in Japan) just about 24 hours.
The day after I got back (today) was a work day, but it was shorter than usual because there was seriously nothing to do. The Big Boss called it a day an hour earlier than normal. This was surprising, because we also started the work day an hour later than normal. Ah well. It's the weekend again as well. I'm going to do so much sleeping, hopefully helping to retune my biological clock.