​It’s time to dump Tim. Mick picks out Sexy Serena as our new SAT Nav Guide. I object and choose the more straitlaced Jane, she has a direct, no-nonsense, trust me voice. I think she sounds reliable until I hear her lilting and teasing ‘roundabout’ inflection. Can we really count on her to get us to our destination? Our first family trip for a while and our first road trip in the UK for absolutely ages. We’re in Mick's new Landrover. No comment! I am determined to make this car journey fun.

We’re leaving Broughton in Lincolnshire and heading to 'Broughton Place' in Edinburgh for two nights. Home from home perhaps, perhaps not. Mick announces that he is unimpressed with the bed and breakfast we are going to. I agree. The reception staff’s clipped English pronunciation phone voices and ‘the computer says no’ approach to changing the date of our trip was not the Scottish welcome we were hoping for. Our stoicism, or is it stubbornness, is admirable. Fine - if we can’t change the booking we’ll bloody use it, even if it means listening to Mick’s Scottish accent all the way there.
 
Jane claims it is only a four and a half hour drive to Broughton from Broughton, but the AA Breakdown Insurance, prudently joined prior to departure, claims it is six. Time will tell.

It is, of course, peeing it down with rain.

 I was driving through the village today, on the way to Scunthorpe to get Betsy a new bank account set up for university, when she asked the question, “Mum if you hadn’t gone to university and chosen to live abroad do you think you would have always lived in Broughton or somewhere close by? Would you have lived at home?" My answer was “I doubt it” to which Betsy asked “Why not? Hmmm… good question. When I stop to think it doesn’t really make sense to not have stayed local. It seems that I’m a bit Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde! I love to Live Abroad, I love to be at home. It is same same but different!

It's the last week of term at my old school, Bangkok Patana. Although it is overseas I feel like I'm living at home in Thailand, yet to my family in the UK, I am living abroad. My teacher friends are frantically busy getting ready for the holidays; be it packing for school improvements, organising end of term assemblies or planning final lessons - it is full on. I remember that buzz only too well and just a teeny bit of me misses it, but, to be honest, not too much. It is hard to think that it is nearly a whole academic year since I left my role as Head of Libraries. Since then I've spent a good chunk of time back in Broughton, Lincolnshire hanging out with my oldies and living the life of a retired 50 something, let's pretend I'm cool, Porsche driver! What with blogging and reading and writing and swimming, I really don't have time to go to work any more! I spend my time now reflecting on living at home or living abroad! 

I am just recovering from the jet-lag of having recently found myself back on a plane, (I do seem to spend quite a lot of my time saying goodbye) This time I was flying direct to Bangkok on British Airways from the expansive and imposing Terminal 5 at  Heathrow, rather than via Schiphol, with KLM from dinky little Humberside airport. It got me thinking about which is the best airport?

I've realised that social awkwardness is something I definitely have. For example:

​I’ve just had an automated email from KLM, asking me to give feedback on my recent flight to Humberside from Bangkok. My granddad used to say to me, “if you haven’t got anything nice to say then don’t say anything at all.” I will not, therefore, be completing the feedback survey.