Up and down in Hong Kong

This evening we had to go to a friend's flat to feed her cats. This was nice, because it meant we had cats to play with, docile, plump cats that peer at us with curiousity but don't run up and down curtains wailing, like our kitten-sized houseguest from a week ago.

However, it did mean walking down the 12 floors from our apartment, which isn't so bad until you remember we'll have to walk back up 12 floors before we go to bed tonight. Into each life some pain must fall.

As a result, I didn't want to leave our apartment. I'd already walked up 12 flights of stairs, and made a stew from chickpeas and tomatoes and far too much chilli powder, and was in the middle of listening to the latest, greatest Half Man Half Biscuit album. What need did I have of stairs, and cats, and more stairs?

Still, it was good to get out of the house. I'm a little worried because I've got a couple of weeks away from home coming up that I've got to pack for, and one week is in baltic Bellevue, Washington, and the other is in sultry Singapore, so that means a heap of hot weather gear and cold weather gear, and having to lug the damn luggage down the stairs, which, although it's two days away still fills me with dread. Like the often put-off will-it-be won't-it-be root canal, the impending doom of my spine is like a tornado on the horizon, getting gradually closer.

Still, if I do hurt my back hauling my bag down all those stairs, at least I'll be in the US, wh
ere socialised medicine is free for all and ... oh dear. Maybe I'll just take a pair of underpants and some woolly socks and buy everything else at the airport.