When Jon told me he was totally sick of planning, organising and booking for an extended holiday I found it hard to acknowledge that I could feel the same way. But readers, I'm currently suffering the same syndrome.
Deciding on a schedule, booking flights, vaccinations, visas, accommodation, insurance and accumulating new electronic necessities like eReaders, a netbook and camera and deciding if existing electronic necessities like mp3 players, noise cancelling headphones and mobile phones need to be upgraded, has taken a toll on my enthusiasm.
It's a relief to have all the major flights and the first 3 weeks accommodation in Thailand and Nepal booked. I'm pretty much over it. We'll be in Chiang Mai at the end of the third week and from there we'll decide where we head next.
With Christmas looming, I'll leave you with one of my favorite Christmas tunes:
Hi Mark,
ReplyDeleteSo glad you opened up your comments. I HAVE SO MUCH TO OFFER.
First off, you should buy an iPad. I'm guessing that, like Jonny, you pretend to hate Mac products. That's fine. You can just buy one and keep it a secret. Maybe you can mention in all your blog posts how great your netbook is even though it has a stupid mini keyboard, when actually you're typing them out on the stupid mini touch-screen keyboard of an iPad. Keeping secrets from your blog audience is one of the greatest joys a blogger can have. For instance, Jonny and I pretend to be cycling around Asia, but actually we have a huge, real-gold-coloured, overland vehicle that we're driving around in, and sometimes we get the bikes out of the back of it to pose for photos and such. It has a sunroof, leather seats and air-con.
Btw, I don't have an iPad, so maybe don't take my advice? I have a Macbook Air which is 5000x better than Jonny's netbook, at only 4x the price! BARGAIN. If you buy a Macbook Air you will congratulate yourself for such a great purchase forever and ever. I'm not kidding. You may fight for usage rights with Sue, though. Maybe you should buy two and be twinsies?
Jonny says you got your eReader, so that's good. As a reader, I totally believe in the power of e-Ink and I scoff at anyone who thinks they don't need an e-Reader because they have a computer. Dumdums. Can I recommend Villette in audiobook format for the mp3 player that won't die, despite being run over? Perhaps you can download the free version at Librivx.org. Perhaps you have seen it mentioned, at least once or maybe fifteen times, on my blog. Villette is essential reading for all overseas trips, oh and for life in general. Also, you will need an audiobook for when you can't read on buses/planes because it makes you nauseous, and you don't feel like listening to music.
Don't upgrade your mobile phone. Jonny is all like, "Oh it must have blah blah blah, technical blah blah, bands?, gsm?" and I'm like, "Huh?" Just take whatever you have. You can buy one o/s if you need a new one, but you won't, because you'll Skype your kids from your iPad, remember? You can't Skype from a netbook because the sound quality is poor. It's TRUE. Also, you won't need a new mobile phone for gps maps or anything, because you'll have your iPad. And you can just like, googlemaps on that! Or something! And you won't need a phone with a better camera, because people born before 1984, ie. me and anyone older than me, literally do not know how to use a mobile phone camera, unless it's a super emergency, and even then it takes forever to set it up and we do that weird tapping thing at it and find it really confusing that you have to press the touch-screen to "take" the photo... what, no actual "button"?
Oh wait, Jonny told me about how you got a netbook from JBHi-Fi....... maybe you could take it back and exchange it for a Mac product? Or buy an iPad as well, for Sue. You can sync it to the netbook. Problem solved. I'm so relieved!
Noise cancelling headphones are awesome but I caught the magic word there, "upgrade," which means you ALREADY HAVE A PAIR. As the partner of a tech-geek, I know that this is basically a "fun" purchase, not a necessary one. Like, OK, every year Brora (brora.co.uk) comes out with a new cashmere fair isle sweater in a different colour way to the year before, and of course I have to "upgrade" to the new colours, but what I am basically doing is buying a brand new fair isle cashmere sweater every year because it's fun to do so, when really, a cashmere sweater will last forever if you hand wash it properly, comb it, and keep it away from moths. In other words, you don't need to upgrade your headphones, unless they don't work. What, you need the ones that weigh 20 grams less? No you don't!
OK, I'm glad we did this!