One week today I fly off home to Australia for one month!!
Total travel time for this trip is about 30 hours – door to door – from the time I leave here, sit in the airport, sit in a plane, sit in another airport, sit in another plane, get through customs & the rental car counter and then drive to my friend's house.
From Washington DC to Los Angeles is 5 or 6 hours. Then it is 14 & a half hours flying across the Pacific where you wonder if you should have paid more attention during the safety demonstration on "water landings".
You know it is going to be a long trip when they welcome you aboard and tell you that "for your enjoyment we have 6 movies to show during this flight".
You know it is already way too long when you eat a meal, watch a movie, have a nap and still have not gone half way!
I have never quite managed to grasp the International Date Line effect …. I leave on Saturday & arrive on Monday – what happened to Sunday? Coming back I get to land in LA before I have taken off in Sydney!
I tend to dress for the worst…. all cotton so my clothes don't melt to me in the event of fire, joggers incase I have to sprint away from a burning aircraft and all my valuables at my feet because there is NO way I am leaving my "personal effects" in the case of an evacuation!
It is no wonder then, that my mind conjures up the image of a great big blood clot forming in my leg and insidiously travelling to my lungs and thus ruining my holiday. United shows a little film of leg lift exercises you can do during the flight to help prevent the likelihood of DVT. Well…. I am just a smidgen over 5'8" tall and when the person in front puts their seat back my knees are touching it and there is no way in hell I can do any sort of leg exercise except wriggle my toes (which of course are swelling in my joggers!).
Having seen a few studies recently on the success of compression stockings in not only preventing DVT but also alleviating some of the jet lag tiredness I decided to buy a pair. (BTW, one of these studies involved people wearing the stockings on one way of their journey and not in the return direction or vice versa and then answering a questionnaire on how they felt as well as having medical tests done on blood pressure and various other tests of their blood flow oxygenation and efficiency).
So my thigh high medium compression stockings arrived and today was "test day". Mmmmmm! Not so sexy but at least they are in a suntan shade and not surgical white. They have a sort of rubberised top with lace on the showing side – though I have no idea why the manufacturer would put something sexy on these. They are not the sort of stocking that is going to tempt my fellow passenger into a hustling me into the mile high club!
Putting them on was a little bit challenging but then they are supposed to be tight. The rubber grip is supposed to stop them from falling down but it does not feel nice on the skin and because they are tight there does tend to be a little bit of flesh overflow!! This overflow is somewhat lessened upon walking when the bands roll over at the top … I'm not sure they are meant to do that! LOL . Once rolled over the rubber tended to stick to the skirt I had on today giving it a weird look which I am sure the fashion designer did not envisage on his creation!
And so, the all up assessment is: I doubt that these are going to last on my legs any longer than the time between take off and "you are now free to move about…"
Tomorrow I will start stressing about what to pack ….
Read and post comments | Send to a friend