The Lonesome Road

I (thankfully) am not a frequent flyer. So, when the time comes to make a  long(ish) air trip, I look forward to it.

I flew to California yesterday, and it’s easy to distinguish the frequent flyers from the newbies and recreational travellers. The FF’s, once they board the plane, simply use it as an extension of their office (well, most of them are business travellers) and get to work immediately. They don’t even bother to look up during the safety instructions - I’m pretty sure they know it all by now.

Newbies on the other hand see everything. It’s fun to watch the kids with their wide eyed wonder. And then there are people like me who sleep through all the boring intro to the flight - and wake up when the food service comes in .  But this time, I had a secret weapon during the flight. My camera.

I wanted to take pics from an airplane for a long time - and I got my chance yesterday. Height really gives perspective - it shows us how small we really are on this planet of ours. By the time you climb to cruising altitude, almost all the man made structures look like dinky toys. The cool thing about the US is that there are vast areas of unused space. As we were nearing California, I took snaps of this huge area where the only things that I could see were mountains and ridges (and a lot of dirt). Another nice effect that can be seen is when the landing approach is over water - from high in the sky, the water looks unmoving, but as the plane comes lower and lower, the illusion is dispelled. However, since it happens so slowly, it almost looks as if the water is going from “pause” to “play”.

Anyway, I will stop now. Need to go out and have some fun!

Until next time - enjoy the last days of summer!

The last two days have been pure hell. With temperatures in the range of 40 degrees (celcius) and almost no wind, any place feels like a sauna. It’s not that I’m not used to the heat and the humidity. The places I’ve lived in boasted temperatures and humidity that would rival local conditions easily.

There just seems to be something different about the heat here. I mean - I’m home, with the fan (yes, I do not have air conditioning) on and I’m sweating.

Anshul seems to have a theory that I have become used to the cold over the last half year and can no longer take the heat. I’m not so sure of that theory. If I need to have some climate control, the only place I can get that is in college. Imagine going to college during summer holidays - just to beat the heat.

The thing is, the more you know - the hotter it is . Back home, I never looked at the daily weather forecast. Here, with the ever-changing weather, it’s become a bit of a habit to see what the forecasters say. The problem is that Weather.com has these huge warning signs and temperature maps that scream out bad news. Today’s news is that the temperatures are neat record high and that there is an Air Stagnation advisory. With all these warnings, it just feels hotter than it is.

I wish I had air conditioning…..

Until next time, stay cool!