countdown to europe 2010

i can't believe we're going to be leaving in a week's time. i don't feel ready yet. i've packed my clothes, but the underwear, socks, electronics, and toiletries are still out of the bag.

things started piling up after we applied for our schengen visa. when we got our passports back from the spanish embassy, we had to make an appointment with the UK embassy for our visa application, and when that got approved, we rushed through all the hotel reservations and flight/rail bookings.

on top of that, PAL cancelled our flight to HK on october 8 and moved us to october 9 at 8am. i had to call them to rebook us to an earlier flight on the 8th, since we were going to catch our flight to paris at 10am on the 9th. it took me a while to actually connect to an agent, and when i did, they had to transfer me to two more agents just to give me my booking. no matter, though. after all the stress, i was able to get us the flight. i really just wish we didn't have to encounter these things.

and because of these mishaps, i'm kind of expecting the trip to be awesome. i usually try not to put such expectations on my trips, because that actually ruins them, but i can't help it this time. i think susie and i deserve this break after all the grunting and running around we've done for it. and i swear that next time, i'm going to book everything A YEAR early, and not wait for the last minute.

aside from the trip itself, i'm looking forward to testing out my HTC desire. it went through some repairs a few weeks back, and is now in tip-top shape. it now holds our itinerary using tripit, and even has links saved up on springpad for places of interest in the cities we're visiting. its 5MP camera will be used heavily, mostly to share photos on twitter and facebook of the things i find curious along the way. i hope my new gadget steps up.

so here's hoping tiny annoyances end now, and that we can sail smoothly through next week, and dive happily into the trip. :)