Counting Down to January 6. 2007

Best of New Zealand Fly Fishing of Los Angeles has been helping with my ground arrangements. Everything went perfectly until Wednesday, December 20, when, being distracted by activities at my office, I responded too quickly to Connie of BoNZ's email and chose to have the package of final arrangment materials AND my plane tickets sent to my office by UPS instead of my house. Brain sneeze. Not the right choice on my part.

Of course, UPS didn't deliver to the office the next day and as I hastely left the office, thinking happily that the office was closed on Friday, it never crossed my mind that the all important package had not arrived. Later, as the Metro passed Courthouse on the way to my grandson's home in Virginia, I realized, "Goofy, you didn't get the package! You" I said to my disneyesque alter ego, "won't be able to use those wonderful magic few hours on the drive to Ohio for Christmas, while your wife Sharon is driving, to check the map and the schedule and the tickets and really start to get into spirit of the trip....as your wise alter ego, Uncle Scrooge, had for some time planned."

Hours later, happy Christmas hugs from my grandson still making me smile, but now back at home in Maryland, I went to the computer, sent off an email to Connie, and asked if she could trace the package. I luckily also used the contact address on the http://www.bestofnzflyfishing.com/ website for Mike. Turns out. because it was late when I sent off the email to Connie, I was confused. I used .com for Connie's email address instead of .net. The next morning, way early for LA, Connie got the message from Mike that had been intended for her anyway and she called me. Connie promised to track down the package and see if she could get UPS to deliver the package to my home before I left for Ohio Saturday morning and sure enough, that's what happened. Amazing, just amazing. Somehow Connie got through to UPS, helped them find the undelivered package, changed the address and Brown got the package onto a different truck, heading for Maryland. Heck, maybe they just readdressed it, sent it back to the hub in Fairbanks, Alaska and then redelivered it to Baltimore, put it on a train and well, you get the idea. Amazing. I got the package early Saturday morning.

Isn't it wonderful. I am being sent around the world on the advice of Connie and she actually works for a company with people who are so incredibly attentive and work so hard to help their customers solve a problem EVEN if the problem was created by the customer's own mistake? Wow! This portends well for a great trip......I do stupid stuff and they fix it. What if I decide to take the rocket ride back across Buller Gorge?

Anyway, I digress. I was able to read the contents of the package, review the map and learn a little more about one of the new highlights of the trip, a voyage to Doubtful Sound in Fjordland.

So here I sit at Grandma's house in Ohio, writing this new entry for the blog and getting ready to roll. Just a few more days now. Then I fly 5 hours to San Francisco, 15 hours to Sydney, and a couple hours to Auckland. Piece of cake. I bought a copy of "Against the Day." So how many pages of Thomas Pynchon's longest novel can a guy with new glasses and a special reading light from his daughter-in-law read in a day of flying around the world to catch a fish. Stay tuned and find out. Next "Focus on Fishing - What I'm Taking in My FishPond Roller Bag"
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