Ten Ways an Unprepared Adult can Try to Entertain and Unhappy Child.

1. Play ‘Where’s Mummy?’ Limited duration to this game and it starts to backfire when there is no answer to the question.
2. ‘How to open a backagon’ (I don’t know how to spell that and what it is—a ball that becomes a thing if it touches metal. But obviously just the ‘right type of metal’).
3. ‘Where’s B——?’ And other peeping games. Much more successful as able to locate the subject in the game.
4. ‘Crawly Fingers’. Aka ‘Tickles’.
5. Championship Standard Imaginary Chess.
6. ‘Blankey Superman’.
7. ‘Cat’s Cradle’. With the loose threads from blankey.
8. ‘Why are they here?’ Like the chess, this seems a one sided game when played with a two year old.
9. ‘Quieteys’. Who can sit still and say nothing the longest. That is, unfortunately, not a game that lasts long.
10. ‘Traces’. Tracing the patterns on the surgery window.

Ten Ways to Entertain Yourself on an Aircraft for Fourteen Hours with Only Three Hours Sleep.

1. Writing, or talking to anyone who'll listen, about how you had only three hours sleep—ten hours ago—after being up eleven hours, after four hours of sleep, after night shift ...
2. Watching 'Up'. Cute, but why did the child's parents not wonder where the be-jeebers he had gone to. The problem with his inattentive parents was more serious than even he made out.
3. Watching 'Inglorious Basterds'. Yeah, Brad's accent was a little annoying. Lots of blood.
4. Watching 'The Ugly Truth'. Mediocre.
5. Watching 'The September Issue'. Really quite interesting, visually exciting. She is an odd woman—a sad woman maybe.
6. Analysing and surveying the map, distance covered in meters and yards, time to destination and outside temperature.
7. Texas Hold 'em. Lucky it wasn't my money.
8. Eating off a plastic tray with a plastic knife and fork while your elbows are attached to your ribs by the economy of spacing in the economy cabin. This sounds simple. It is easier to stand on your head and juggle. I felt like I was in the womb with cutlery.
9. Filling in your disembarkation card—or watching someone else do it for you.
10. Trying to find innovative ways of sleeping upright. Economy is tight, but not tight enough to support your neck in an upright position, unfortunately. Inevitably you must drool on a stranger's shoulder.