The Lonely Dinosaur Bag

When I landed at Gatwick Airport this morning and made my way to the baggage claim area, I saw this little suitcase sitting all by its lonesome between some empty carousels. All I could think of was that some poor kid is now on vacation (or returning from vacation) without his dinosaur-printed bag. (Could be her bag, I suppose, but I'm adhering to the tired gender stereotype that dinosaurs tend to be a boy thing.) Did it get on the wrong plane? Did the family, in haste, accidentally leave it behind? It has a tag attached so hopefully it will get to its rightful owner.

My trip was happily uneventful. On the plane I read an interesting YA memoir called "All Boys Aren't Blue," about growing up gay and Black. It's been a controversial book, challenged by conservative parent groups in some American school districts, but I found it thought provoking and I'm glad we have it in our library. I also watched a Hugh Jackman movie called "Reminiscence," which was visually interesting, set in Miami after the city has been flooded by rising sea levels -- but I didn't love the plot. Kind of "Blade Runner" lite.

When I was still in Tampa I went to Starbucks for a coffee before my plane, and I was behind a British guy who ordered several drinks. He wanted to pay with cash but the attendant said it was a no-cash store, and the guy didn't have a card. His bill was $22. The cashier was hemming and hawing, apparently unable to void the transaction, so I said, "Let me get it." I was actually prepared to just pay the guy's tab to move things along, as insane as that sounds, but he gave me his $20 bill so that basically evened it out. I never do things like that and I'm afraid my attempt to be kind simply came across as grumpy, because, well, I was a little grumpy, mainly with the cashier. But he did thank me, for what it's worth.

I am now done with my production of Florivideos™, but I have one more to show you:

That was me saying goodbye to Maybelline yesterday morning. I usually get in her yard and kneel in the grass, and she comes and basically climbs onto my lap, which gets me completely filthy, as you can see. (In fact I later threw away those shorts, which were many years old and thinning in places -- and thinning shorts are never good.) We played with her Jolly Egg, too, so she got a workout. Don't worry -- I took a shower before the plane.

And now I'm back home with Olga, who upon seeing me bounded through the house and insisted we play with her Kong in the garden. Dogs are dogs, on both sides of the ocean.