Trans-Atlantica - Airports and Airplanes.

So, this morning was the morning! I was finally able to depart on my journey across the clouds! Into lands unknown and no doubt full of adventure! At least I hope so, otherwise this is going to be a very dull and short lived segment.

I know I touched on this last time, but I love flying. The act of sitting in a plane and hurtling through the sky is something I take a great amount of pleasure in, and the thrill of take-off is something that always leaves me giddy and lurching my neck towards the nearest window. If you want proof of a miracle, don't look to the ethereal - Look at the way mankind rebelled at the idea of being on the ground, padding along on their own two feet like the vast majority of mammals, and launched themselves into the sky, the sea and the very depths of space.

Flying also doesn't take all that long really. Oh, I know it can feel like.forever, but it's really not! My own flight took roughly eleven or twelve hours actual flight time to cover thousands of miles, so for me, it's not an unattractive way to travel at all.

That is, of course, until you factor in airports. Airports are, for the most part, a waste of everyone's time. The level of security is downright demoralizing and even if you accept that level of discomfort for the sake of national security, there's still the infuriating design and management choices that leave your gates a mile apart, with ten minutes to get there because they don't show where you need to be until then and a boarding system that makes getting on and off aircraft an absolute nightmare.

I've spent my entire day on airplanes and in airports. This should give you an idea of the tone of what's about to come.

I started it generally buzzed, if not terribly nervous. Well, truth be told I started it positively baffled because, well...

This is the knife I received with my bacon sandwich in Wetherspoons in Birmingham and I have no idea what it's for. It's not for spreading as that had already been taken care of and I don't see that diddy blade cutting a piece of paper let alone through bread and bacon, do what is it for?! And for that matter, what is it with Wetherspoons and book shelves these days?

But I digress, that was the first of the minor puzzlements that was to colour my day.

I left Birmingham for Amsterdam early in the the morning on KLM airlines, and I honestly don't think I have enough good things to say about KLM airlines. It's not so much that they're good, as it is that they're absurdly stereotypical. It's like the airline was run by a British sitcom's idea of the Dutch, and it made the experience of flying with then and being bombarded with their native language and highly accented English a pleasure. I'm not just being an ignorant little Englander here,making fun of Johnny Forgiener with his silly accent - They encourage it. Check out their plastic cups for goodness sake!

I really can't say enough good things about my limited stay in Amsterdam airport either. I mean, it still looked like any other airport from the outside,

But all credit to the place, the gate for my connecting flight was right around the corner from the flight I had just walked off and they let you go there almost immediately. That being said though, the immigration officer there was surprisingly intense - Although that could be just the fact that his accent both intensified and softened everything he said, but he was still more laid back and to the point than his American conterparts... But then he is Dutch afterall, I suppose.

Overall, great little airport, and Amsterdam's schizophrenic gift shops containing traditional windmills and clogs and their widely renown soft drug and red light culture are worth nosing in alone, especially if you're after tasteful souvenirs for the entire family. Shame about the bizarrely conspicuous and somewhat tacky Irish theme pub though...

From there I moved onto the biggie, eight hours from Amsterdam to Miniapolis via Delta airlines. Delta aren't all that bad really, they actually give you free headphones instead of trying to charge you five dollars for them and as the flight was near empty there was plenty of room to move and laze about. Although, one question does arise...

I can't embed video on this device, but give this a click and then please, join me in asking, wtf is this bout of insanity that distracts you from the actual safety content Delta?! Seriously, with my first safety announcement mostly being in anotherlanguage and then that I'm pretty certain that the airlines were counting on me dying in the event of an accident.

On reflection, I think my rant above may be less about airports in general and more about American airports. I don't want to dwell on it, but as soon as we hit Minneaplois my mood tanked. I spoke last time about my fears of immigration and to be honest I did kind of breeze through it this time (apparently nobody thinks my month long stay is as bizarre as I do), but the wait to get there alone is soul destroying. It's the closest to seeing human beings herded like cattle that I've experienced and if there are things closer I never want to experience them. Of course, I also said that fresh horrors would await and I was sadly prophetic there too. As I was coming onto the final door, having cleared immigration, cleared customs, breezed my way through checks at two other airports in two other countries, one single old man behind the very last desk in front of the very last door to my very last flight decides that my passport doesn't look like me.

The phrases typical, sod's law and all others of their ilk don't even begin to cover it.

At one point I had four men pouring over my passport and several other forms of ID I'd desperatly thrown out at that point to show that, you know,people change appearance over time, and my heart was going so fast it was painful. I'm glad they let me in, because I think if they hadn't that would've dropped me there and then. I was feeling pangs from that for almost half an hour afterwards, and if there's only one black mark on this trip then that would be a bloody dark stain for sure.

The worst thing though, physical pain aside, was that I was apologising to them through. Oh, to be British...

Anyway, finally out of federal space and into the airport proper, I was in Minneaplois!

Wait, did it snow in Amsterdam?!

From there everything was... Well, I wouldn't say plain sailing. The flight to Denver was packed full of people, not a single seat free, and so getting on and off was a nightmare. The plane itself had also seen better days, with wobbly wings, flickering lights and a landing that was a bone shaking as they came all thrown into the mix. I'm also not sure if the tanoy was busted to pieces or the crew were completely incomprehensible, as my hopes for a clear safety announcement were dashed by everything they said over it not even sounding English.

The snow being sucked through the jet engines into a delicate white ribbon was pretty though.

Soon enough we reached Denver where I was planning to try and check out the.illuminati murals but to be honest, I was so done in by this point and baffled by the fact they have a train there, that I plain forgot. I did find this wonderful dragon though!

So! I'm somewhat agitated, very much exhausted, but I am here! And it's snowing! So if you don't mind, I'm going to go stare at the pretty white stuff we never see in my town anymore and hopefully return with something a little less rantastic next time. Until then!

Trans-Atlantica - AAA-MERR-EEEE-KAAA!

This time tomorrow, I will be in the sky. I can't tell you for sure where I'll be flying over, heck for all I know I'll be sat at an airport anxiously awaiting the chance to hop on another plane to get back into the sky, but I can tell you where I'm going - America!

That's right, I'm off to the wedding of a good friend and no doubt getting into all kinds of trouble inbetween. Typically I'm heading over there right as a second Cold War is brewing, but I figure if the bombs look set to drop while I'm over there at least I'll be in a much, much more spread out target that isn't likely to be turned to radioactive glass in one hit? Of course, it'll be a much more prominent target that's likely to get hit first... Hm, just can't win it seems!

Thanks to this development, the blog will be taking a slightly different turn this month. From Cover to Cover will be returning as planned (and is, in fact, already written out and ready to go!) but for the most part we're re-purposing as a travel blog, reporting anything interesting that's happened to me while on my travels and perhaps a few more run of the mill posts if I feel particularly inspired by anything. This will probably be the last post I'm writing on an actual, honest to God keyboard for awhile - With the rest going to be tapped out on a tablet, so please, forgive me if things are rougher than usual this month.

This has been a long time coming and I can't believe it's here. That's the thing when you make big plans, you spend so long preparing for them that when they come they still manage to take you by surprise, because you've sculpted them into something bigger than they are and it doesn't feel like they can fit into an actual, real event any more. But this one is a-comin', and to be frank, I'm a bag of nerves.

I shouldn't be really, I'm going to be staying with some wonderful people, and attending some wonderful events - I can tell you off the top of my head that as well as the wedding, we will be doing a version of our fledgling podcast Now Playing Now over there and towards the end of my trip I'll be going to Emerald City Comic Con. If you want a taste of the kind of thing you might be able to expect over the coming month, here's some pretty pictures I took in Arizona from 2012.

And of course, the obligatory cactus shaped like a penis. 

Still, this is going to be the longest time I've been away from home, visiting a number of different states across the country, and even though I'm sure everything is in order - I can't suppress that dread, irrational feeling of something being forgotten. But greater than that, I can't help but wonder if this is all a good idea to begin with. That the whole endeavour is much too much, and I won't be able to cope.

Then of course, there's the getting there. Now I'm not one of these people who hate flying - I love flying. I think it's one of humanities greatest accomplishments and something we take very much  for granted. True the actual experience is akin to being on a train that wobbles more than it should, but the act of propelling ourselves into the sky by pure science and engineering alone? That's impressive, and almost makes up for our many other failings as a species. My problem is not with flying, it's with airports. The change over flights, the constant walking, the feeling that you haven't actually managed to get anywhere because almost every airport, no matter the city, is too near identical to make out where you are. I'm catching a connecting flight in Amsterdam, never having set foot in that part of Europe before, but the best I can hope for is a view of it from the sky and then a never ending view of parking lots and runways and the usual trappings of the international stopping station inside.

There's also the various checks and searches, which I don't mind for the most part. Everyone likes to give the TSA a hard time, but they were incredibly nice and understanding the last time I flew over. Yes the searches can be absurd, but at least the people were nice about it. My main problem last time was immigration. For some reason the man behind the counter took an instant dislike to me, and I had to justify every single part of my visit to him in minute detail with him trying to trip me up at every turn. With this venture being longer and altogether more eclectic, I can't help but wonder if they're even going to let me in - Even though they really have no rational grounds to stop me. Everything is wonderful and above board, all my papers are in order, and I definitely have passage booked home. Yet still the irrational fear that they will prove to be a barrier in my way remains. I'm sure, in reality, I'll breeze through the part I'm dreading most and there'll be some fresh hell in a process that I had no issue with last time, but we'll see! Fingers crossed there'll be no issues at all. Fingers very much crossed!

These are the worries that plague me, these and a dozen more, and if I'm perfectly honest the words 'I don't want to go!' have crossed my mind like it's a Tumblr blog subscribed to nothing but gifs of David Tennant's face. They're in my mind right now, in fact, but I thought the same about Ireland. And I had an absolute blast. So I'm sure, once my feet hit the ground on the other side, and I see some friendly faces, all will be well. But you can see how all that works out tomorrow!

I'll see you all the other side of the pond! Gud Blass AAA-MURIKA!