The trip started well, after booking my first consultation at 4pm, my 2 hour drive from Mackay airport after the plane landing at 3pm was always going to be a struggle. I got into my new pretty red little car and punched the details into my GPS. 2 hours, 5 mins… Looked like mostly straight roads, maybe with a bit of ah… tactical acceleration I could make it in an hour and a half and not be too late.

I got about 20 minutes into the trip and looked at my phone, realising I needed to call ahead and let them know I was going to be late, no reception. Weird, didn’t think I was THAT far out of town, but ok, I’ll call when I get to my stop. You don’t get traffic when you are in a hurry in this sort of place, but you do get animal crossings; Cows, twice. Not just 5 or 10 cows either, I’m talking what seemed like one hundred or so.

Eventually I got to town and tried to call again, but still no reception. Oh well, better hurry; checked in, got changed and headed off 5 mins down the road to the appointment. They had been trying to ring me, as had the sales rep, and my boss – I was advised then that there is no reception unless you are with Telstra, and everywhere was closed after 3pm. I guessed that my second appointment was still going to be on and turned up anyway – it was. After that, I decided to take the fast food route for dinner – only Red Rooter was open… Oh well, drive through will be nice and quick. Not.

25 minutes I sat with the buzzbox off waiting to move. There was only 1 car in front of me. Eventually I ordered, gave the girl $20.45 for my $10.45 meal and got $9 change. I counted it, looked at her and she just looked very vacant. I wasn’t in the mood to give a primary school maths lesson, so I just left… the $1 was a tip for the uh… service.

The rest of the trip wasn’t nearly as interesting as the first night – which was ##exampled by one family saying “so what do you do during the day in boringbah?� Besides a bit of a workout at the gym, I did bugger all during the days.

The most memorable parts of the trip were as follows (in random order);

• One boy asked his mum a question, that she answered “I’m not an octopus, how do you expect me to remember that?â€?

• Ordered a pizza one night, after telling the girl my name was Brendan, she put down Bruno. I waited 40 minutes for the pizza, yet there was no one coming or going from the shop, and when they gave it to me it was supreme – I ordered meat lovers. They re-made it and called my name “Brunoâ€? I took the pizza and told the girl she could call me Brendan and gave her a wink.

• Was craving fish and chips one night, so went to the restaurant attached to the hotel, a Chinese Restaurant that had a whole separate “Aussie Menuâ€?. The heading was “Aussie Menu – all meals served with chipsâ€?. Brilliant, so I ordered one fish and chips to be told “sorry, we don’t have chips anymoreâ€?.

• At an appointment with a mum and daughter (in yr 9) and asked “what is 6 times 6?â€? Before the girl had a chance to think, the mother yells “12!â€? so the girl agrees. I asked “Are you sure… 6 TIMES 6…â€? only to be told by the mother “yeah, it’s bloody 12, stop trying to trick herâ€?. The girl looked on the wall at her timetable poster and told me it was 36, to which mum chimed in “Oh, I thought you mean 6 with a little 2 up above itâ€?.

• The final point to remember was in subway, a guy came in with his ear pierced, one of the big holes, about the size of a 10c coin, only to have the loudmouth busy body woman behind him snarl “is that the thing these days?… big bloody holes in your body… looks bloody stupid to me.. I don’t understand you kids… did it hurt?â€? He ignored her, and a wise decision I think.

The trip ended much more uneventfully than it had started and I was home before I knew it, back to the real world. I love the trips away, as much because its eye opening as anything else.