Points in Time

Tuesday

05:30 Starting the car so early is not a good time for the dash to light up and flash with the warning saying one of the headlamp bulbs has blown. Looking at the beam – on the passenger side too which is a real pain to change.

07.55 Finished washing the dirt and grim off my hands and face having removed the ECU, air filter, air intake pipes, changed the bulb and replaced all the bits. Only took three of us to manage it as well.

08.20 Scrambled egg and bacon toasted sandwich… mmmm.

09.15 Film our Political Top Trumps set – its conference season and these are doing the doing the rounds in Manchester at the Labour Conference. Apparently David Cameron’s memoirs are worth more that Gordon Brown’s!! £2.4m vs £1.8m

10.00 Just heading into town to see the 2nd Battalion Fusiliers be given the key to the City of London by the Lord Mayor. Only regiment with two serving George Cross holders don’t you know. Can’t beat a bit of British pomp & ceremony so looking forward to it.

12.30 Passing over Potters Bar section of the M25 heading to Helsinki. There’s been a shooting at a school in western Finland and a number of students have been killed. Its sad to think that a sizeable of what I do is based around the misfortune of others – but I guess that’s the way it is. And anyway its not as if I the only one – anyone working in an A&E department. Interspersed with it all are times that make you smile – seeing the goodness in people and to relish the freedom and unpredictability of life.

15:30 (now Finnish time) Staring to write this blog.

17:25 “Can Mr Hooper please come to the assistance desk”. Turning around as there’s a desk right behind me “Hi, I’m Mr Hooper”. “Four of your bags didn’t get put on the plane”. S**T. Doesn’t really matter which four something I need will be missing. Three I could possibly live without – though would be smelly until I could buy more clothes.

17.30 “It’s not four bags its five!” I had my clothes though so would only be as smelly as usual.

16.45 Met Greg and John off the plane from Brussels, we picked up a hire car and headed up to Kauhajoki. Leaving Helsinki at the witching hour I drove out blindly following the sat nav north to . We didn't have any hotel rooms for the night either - well not within an hour and a half's further drive anyway. Beautiful low lying countryside past vast amounts of woodland interspersed with fjords, golden hour too - when the sun goes down, light streaming through the trees. After a couple of hours the road becomes a dirt track - which is a little worrying. Just wish I now had a manual gear box to appreciate the road properly. Ducking and diving through the trees, occasionally blasting away brief patches of low lying mist.... the only disconcerting bit - above the tree time pure blackness - there has to be a mountain there - no?

22.00 Arriving outside the school 3 hours later, its foggy and chilly at a whopping 6'C. Hungry we head for the local garage spotted on the way in to have a surprising good plate of pan fried chicken and chips.

01.15 Ring ring, ‘Hello” (sleepily). “Hello Mr Hooper… …. ….”, “Sorry I don’t understand”. “Your bags – I have them. I’ll be there in 15 mins”. “OK”. Damn. Waking John up - we got the short straws and had to share, I got to get dressed and went outside.

01.50 Zzzzzzzzz

Wednesday (properly now)

08.30 Open my tripod bag to find that some nice baggage handler kindly dropped or threw my tripod bag around. The handle's broken and now lovely and wobbly.

12.40 French fries that taste of fish – I wonder how you do that.

19.20 Greg – “Hmmm lovely after taste of urine…” Urgh. “Don’t do the yellow ones – no after taste at all.” These Finns are weird liquorice and urine! Yet again with no rooms booked or available in Helsinki we head back there - trying to avoid the moose on the loose.

21.00 Gregs driving now. The sandwich for the petrol station is rank, the donut surprisingly fresh. The passenger seat, now covered in sugar, on XC90’s are really uncomfortable. Nothing I do is stopping my feet from hurting. Need to sleep – but it hurts.

23.00 Sitting in the bar of the hotel for a quick night cap we’ve been in Finland for 29 hours. Driving for 9hrs, sleeping for 6 hrs leaves a of grand total 14 for work (plus the original 9 as well).

Thursday

11.30 Find some really cool stocking fillers in a mall on the way to the airport…. now that would
be giving it away. Two days in Finnland and the Finn's are strange - well more wierd really - very serious and no apparant sense of humour - look at Kimi Raikkonen and thats basically all you get - all the time.

13.00 (now UK time) Just saw Andrew Stephens just walk on the flip down TV screens in the cabin introducing CNN’s business traveller show. When I see him walk (on screen) it always brings back fond memories of a piece to camera in HK Park near the animal enclosures. Andrew had just moved from newspaper to tv and was new to being on screen and all the wonderful weirdness that that entails. To make what he had to say ‘appear’ more interesting I had him walk at the same time as speaking. Obviously this is a 100% natural thing to be able to do but introduce a camera and that throws you all over the place? – Well it did Andrew. I couldn’t place it at first but something was wrong – something familiar. Then it clicked – CCF. Back in school days when doing the Combined Cadet Force – we were made to march and there were a number of boys who just couldn’t do it. Being forced to walk in time made them Monkey March. Swinging same side hands feet together Thinking about it just like one of the teachers at Fernden – Monkey Man. I absolutely lost it and just become a giggling wreck. Thankfully Andrew didn’t take it to heart once I apologised saying it wasn’t his fault and after many more tomes of trying we had one in the bag – that wasn’t too bad at least.

Listening to ELO's Mr Blue Sky, some lamb in jus resting gently in my stomach – happy and contented.