NamesCon - The Gilmour Family Are On Their Way!

As per normal, I’ve arrived at the Qantas Club in Melbourne, Australia, grabbed a coffee and now I find myself sitting down to write my regular “I’m On My Way” to a conference blog. The big difference this time is nothing’s normal, I’m not alone…..Roselyn and our two daughters are with me.

For those of you that do a lot of business travel you’ll understand that you have developed certain habits that create a bubble of calm around you as you make your way through an airport. From the moment we stepped out of the car I knew that my bubble had been well and truly shattered.

For a start, I tend to speed through the airport, weaving my way between the elderly gentlemen on the left while slipping around the family with screaming kids on the right. My family, enraptured with the joys of taking in the airport walked at the same speed of everyone else…..let me assure you, this was a relatively new experience for me.

I’ve managed to convince my family to only travel with carry-on luggage (thank goodness) but you’d be amazed how much a young lady can pack into a case. One of the bags was “substantially” over the weight limit and it took a little bit of extra smiling and joking with the Qantas staff to let us take it on as check-on……so all was good. But for heavens sake.....did she pack lead in that bag????

For those of you that are wondering why I insist on carry-on only….the answer is really simple. When you are doing any sort of city hopping business travel if you lose your bags just once then they’ll never catch-up with you again.

Or in the case of my business partner who was traveling to London he asked the attendant if they could please send his bag through to Los Angeles. The attendant indicated they couldn’t do that and he replied, “You managed to do it last time.”

So after briefing my family about how to ensure we all end up in the high speed line through security we got stuck with a Jetstar plane grew jumping the line, several families who believed that a stroller entitled them to first place (got to get myself one of those) and a number of airport staff that thought it was funny to make everyone wait while they went through the body scanner. One of them even kept forgetting to take stuff out of his pockets and pretended he’d never done it before.

After taking the leisurely stroll through the concourse (I was gritting my teeth) I couldn’t help but listen to the three ladies in tow ooohing and ahhing about the different sites along the way. It then dawned on me…..I’ve done way too much traveling and lost most of the joy and excitement of international flying. I’ve become a grumpy business traveller that complains about what other people think is wondrous.

So I decided to turn a new leaf. Now that we’re in the Qantas Club I’m going to have fun…..and as can be seen by the selfie above it’s looking good already. So watch-out NamesCon the Gilmour family are on their way and we plan to have a great time!

See you all soon!

Michael