Melbourne, Day One

Hello bloggers (And random economists), welcome to one of my first posts in a while.

As most of you know, I left for (and arrived in) Melbourne today, for a 7 day holiday. I noted that I was beginning what I'm hoping will be a fun and exciting vacation on Friday the 13th, a fact that would no doubt send shivers of vindictive pleasure down the spine of every high school teacher of mine who'd ever accused me of being the Antichrist.

To begin with, I had planned on driving to Melbourne, mainly because I love the feeling of driving through country towns (and, inevitably, not stopping as you slowly realise that any town that has a tin shed as a town hall probably isn't worth exploring). I had thought that, what with my shiny, new Lancer, a long interstate drive was just what the doctor ordered.

Alas, though, my mechanic had a different opinion, and I was told that, until my car had at least one service, it would probably be a poor idea to take it for a long journey. So, one day before I was supposed to be driving to Melbourne, I decided to fly. Being a bit of a poor bugger, I chose to fly Virgin, and that was where my adventure began.

I arrived at the airport relatively early, to pick up my ticket and wait pointlessly at the departure gate for a bit. Eventually, my flight came and I happily strode through the boarding area, happy to finally be on my way. About 30 seconds later, I came upon an obstacle. I'd reached a fork in the path, with one path being a well light corridor that I presume continued onto the plane in glorious airport-decor splendor, and the other being a set of concrete stairs, that simply went down to god knows where. A typically cheery Virgin sign on the wall read that passengers with seat numbers 1-14 could take the shiny, happy corridor, while the rest of us would have the reassuring theme of industrial concrete to guide us to our destination. A few passengers, the privileged elite, happily strode forth into the corridor, while the vast unwashed masses began their inevitable trudge down the stairs. Pausing for a moment to express my envy for Business class passengers and their luxurious path, I took the one more traveled by.

Our concrete-laden descent ended up taking us to the airport tarmac, where I happily boarded the plane, eager to find my seat, and also escape the unique smell of airplane fuel being loaded. I sat down on my seat, and was pleasantly surprised to hear Bob Evans being piped through the plane.

Eventually, though, "I believe in Love" was cut off, in favour of a much less romantic, though probably more practical, demonstration of the safety features of the plane. I dutifully listened as Sarah, my wonderful hostess, explained the various things we'd need to do in case of an emergency. I didn't take any of them in, of course, but I figured I could always ask the person next to me, if worst came to worst.

Unless they were already dead, of course. Forgetful people, take note, always try and aim for a middle seat in economy, so you have two potential people to ask for help, if you ever run into problems.

With the safety features of the airplane taken care of, Sarah launched into a chat about the in-flight entertainment that Virgin was offering on the phone. She directed our attention to the wonderful LCD in front of us, she directed our attention to the wonderful controls for those screens on our seats, she explained to us how the wonderful people at Foxtel had provided us with a multitude of wonderful channels to choose from and then, finally, she directed our attention to the wonderful credit card slots next to the LCD panels, which would allow us to actually use all this wonderful entertainment, for the low price of just six dollars.

As Sarah explained all this, the LCD monitor happily showed advertisement after advertisement (Navman GPS - it's like having a local in your car!) I decided not to take up her (incredibly good value) offer, and instead contented myself with a good book instead. The adverts, though, seemed to be there to stay. I periodically tore myself from my book to check up on what was being sold. One of the more interesting ads was for Matavai Resort. The ad wasn't interesting due to anything the resort was offering, but more for the seemingly random ticker tape of words that were scrolling across the bottom of the screen during the entirety of the ad. Along with "Scuba Diving", and "Sailing", and the usual resort-type activities, Matavai also seemed to offer "E Bay", and "Pussies". That one managed to puzzle me, though not nearly as much as the next advert section, which began with a title screen called "Virgin Voyeur Active", and then proceeded to be two minutes of scantily clad women running around in bikinis.

During this all, Sarah again approached, this time with an offer of a sandwich from the menu, or alternatively a drink, or chips. You'll be interested to know that Virgin charges five dollars for two pieces of bread and some ham and cheese. Obviously, Virgin seemed to be the Pizza Shop of the skies, suckering you in with cheap Pizza that goes to Melbourne, only to gouge you on Garlic Bread that keeps the entire operation afloat. Still, because Sarah was cute, and I was hungry, I bought the food all the same.

All too quickly, though, the entire thing was over and the plane landed, leaving me cold, alone and unsatisfied on the Melbourne airport tarmac. I picked up my bag, gave Julian a quick ring to let him know that I'd arrived, and popped off into the toilet. You'll all be interested to know that the humble condom dispenser has now evolved into a much more entrepreneurial device, that not only dispenses condoms, but also does breath mints, breath sprays, deodorant and hair gel. Hooray for capitalism!

Finally, Julian arrived, picked me up, and we went back to his place, where I promptly settled in, and was treated to a viewing of the most bizarre film I've ever seen.

And that's where I'm up to folks. Bit of a long post this one, and I'm sorry for making you all read through it (Hah, I kid myself that you have :P). The aim right now is to basically write one post every night for each night I'm in Melbourne. I guess you'll all know if that's worked out or not after tomorrow night. For now, good night, and hope Adelaide's treating you all well (Except you Trent, you damn Finnish person you :P)