Watty perambulates:

So, I went to Luxembourg; I came back. In the same day, which is a little disconcerting. The hour difference works against you both ways: I get up at stupid o'clock and travel for hours (an hour to Stansted, an hour and a half waiting; an hour on the flight) and by the time we get there (9:30 UK time), half the morning has already gone. Coming back; I'm tired (and a little unwell) and we leave Lux at 7:30 - we arrive in the UK at... 7:30. But it must be bedtime by now...
Anyway, a very positive trip; much dull (dull for you, quite interesting for me - but you don't want to know about mpls technology, and how to renumber an IP range, do you?) discussing, catching up wih old friends and quite the most uninspiring lunch I've ever had....

A little flesh on the bones: Anyone reading this will probably be aware that I work for a well-known Italian confectionery company. Well, for reasons which must be obvious to someone, we are actually based in Luxembourg. So; if there are global projects going on, they will tend to involve meeting in Lux. Which is handy, really because the offices are literally across the road from the airport. It does mean that you don't see anything of the town - but trust me, you only need to see Luxembourg once... Being the kind of company it is, we have a high itinerant population - people spend a year here; a year there, and sooner or later, they all do a stint in Luxembourg. Which they all hate for having little or no social life (Luxemboring my pal Enrica calls it) - but then they are all working 12 to 15-hour days, so what does it matter. What must it be to be young and ruthlessly ambitious? We bumped into William in the mensa at lunchtime - he's in charge of opening up undeveloped markets now; he spent a week in Saudi Arabia recently, and he's off on Monday for two weeks in China. I'm sure it's hard work, but still...

So, the meeting want well, the lunch was not good (very unusual, that - this is an Italian company, for goodness sake) and I started to feel migrainy during the afternoon. Now, I thought migraines were part of my ancient history, but it seems not. Haven't had one that I can remember for years. Perhaps it was the stuffy atmosphere; perhaps it was the chicken; most likely, it was the all-pervading tobacco smoke, which is a low-grade background layer everywhere you go - I never saw anyone actually smoking, which is highly unusual for this company, but it was more of a psychic thing - it's in the stonework. Anyway, cigarette smoke makes me susceptible to migraines for some reason; I no longer carry anti-migraine pills (I don't get migraines now...) and I just got slowly worse for the rest of the day. But I survived the walk to the airport, the meal (which I shouldn't have tried to eat), the flight home (in the dinkiest little aircraft you ever saw), and the journey home in driving rain. All of which is to explain that I'm having a post-migraine day today - I function perfectly normally, but I feel tired and somehow empty. Tomorrow will be back to normal. Whatever that is.

So there were no posts from airports - breakfast was more of a priority in the morning, and I was just too ill in the evening, but I'm back now. Oh, you noticed...