no last minute pot of rooibos at tealuxe, nor tasting plate at burdicks, nor lunch at the plough and stars. von rang up at noon to say goodbye and to tell me he was on his way to a salvage yard (me: what for? him: so that i can build a table. me: do you know how to build a table? him: no, but how hard can it be?) and admonished me for not having a more meaningful time, and i agree. it was all furious packing and dashing about to post offices and libraries (and not even accomplishing very much last minute research for all that. you cannot read a 60 page manuscript in 3 hours, i have realised.) on the other hand, i am delighted i have had the smoothest trip home ever. it looked like it would be one of those disaster travel days. i was running behind schedule all day, lost my phone twice (one of those times i'd locked it into a suitcase by accident) and, on the way to the airport, realised that i hadn't checked in for my sq flight online. but the cab showed up on time, we didn't get held up by construction on the tunnel, the delta people said they could check my baggage all the way through to singapore, and did, the plane was not merely "on time" but "at gate" when i arrived. almost immediately minyin rang up from wodonga for a bit of a chat, i got into new york with just an hour to go before boarding, just enough time to call my parents, leave von a voicemail, suspend my phone service for the rest of the summer, and straight onto plane.