Concorde and me

On her blog Abby has sketched a little owl commenting it's what her hair does when it's humid too.

This is the owl. Abby is a marvellous artist who's got some amazing artwork on her blog.

Anyway I commented saying my hair's the same. When we visited New York back in  - before 9/11 - it was July (I think) and very humid. We never got to go up the Empire State Building because there was nothing to be seen from the top except clouds. We did try once on a clear day, stood in a queue for ages, and then a man announced, "You probably don't want to go up because there's nothing to be seen now."

Each morning I washed my hair and got it looking nice, in the air-conditioned hotel, and the moment I stepped outside the front door: frizz!

I've googled it: we flew to New York on 26th July, 2000. I can say so accurately because it was the day after Concorde crashed. It was also the year Central Park was closed because of a mosquito frenzy. 

The day before we flew Daughter phoned me and said, "Have you heard the news?"

I thought she meant about the mosquitoes so I said, "Yes."

"It'll be fine," she said. "Don't worry about it. Hundreds of planes fly every day without crashing."

"What are you talking about?"

I hadn't flown for years before that and was fairly anxious about it. Strangely enough the fact that a plane going to New York had crashed didn't panic me unduly. As I argued, "What are the chances of a second plane going to New York the next day crashing?"

A bit disconcerting though, in the airport waiting for our flight, and every newspaper has a large photo of the crashing Concorde on its front page.