Tweet
http://www.theage.com.au/national/th...225-197jj.html
MEET Australia's one-man barmy army, Queenslander Douglas Macdonald. The cricket tragic spent weeks looking for two tickets to today's Boxing Day Test. He found them, on eBay, at very inflated prices. He flew down to Melbourne on Thursday, to visit his many Victorian relatives for Christmas and to see the game.
But he left the tickets, worth $200, behind in Queensland.
''Sure enough I had them in a big, big envelope so I couldn't forget them, and naturally it was left behind,'' Mr Macdonald, 54, said. ''It was Friday morning that I found out.''
Advertisement: Story continues below
After briefly considering the possibilities, he decided to fly back to his home in Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast to get them. Friday was too late to express post the tickets to Melbourne and an urgent spell of Facebooking to see if any friends were flying to Melbourne produced nothing.
But even flying back to Queensland had its dramas. Jetstar initially refused to believe that someone would want to fly somewhere, stay at the airport briefly, then fly back.
''There's a rule that you've got to allow two hours between flights and … it took a lot of persuading Jetstar, maybe 20 minutes on the phone, that all I needed to do was walk two steps into the airport - I had someone bring my tickets to the airport - and then get back on.''
Fortunately, it all went to plan. Mr Macdonald left Melbourne at 6pm Friday, flew to Queensland, picked up the tickets, and was back six hours - and $400 - later.
''The Jetstar people couldn't believe it. I had the same flight attendants on the way back … They were very amused.''
Mr Macdonald teaches economics and personal finance. ''The giggle is I try to teach kids how to be sensible with money.'
MEET Australia's one-man barmy army, Queenslander Douglas Macdonald. The cricket tragic spent weeks looking for two tickets to today's Boxing Day Test. He found them, on eBay, at very inflated prices. He flew down to Melbourne on Thursday, to visit his many Victorian relatives for Christmas and to see the game.
But he left the tickets, worth $200, behind in Queensland.
''Sure enough I had them in a big, big envelope so I couldn't forget them, and naturally it was left behind,'' Mr Macdonald, 54, said. ''It was Friday morning that I found out.''
Advertisement: Story continues below
After briefly considering the possibilities, he decided to fly back to his home in Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast to get them. Friday was too late to express post the tickets to Melbourne and an urgent spell of Facebooking to see if any friends were flying to Melbourne produced nothing.
But even flying back to Queensland had its dramas. Jetstar initially refused to believe that someone would want to fly somewhere, stay at the airport briefly, then fly back.
''There's a rule that you've got to allow two hours between flights and … it took a lot of persuading Jetstar, maybe 20 minutes on the phone, that all I needed to do was walk two steps into the airport - I had someone bring my tickets to the airport - and then get back on.''
Fortunately, it all went to plan. Mr Macdonald left Melbourne at 6pm Friday, flew to Queensland, picked up the tickets, and was back six hours - and $400 - later.
''The Jetstar people couldn't believe it. I had the same flight attendants on the way back … They were very amused.''
Mr Macdonald teaches economics and personal finance. ''The giggle is I try to teach kids how to be sensible with money.'
being brought downstairs for questioning because their ATW ticket was being flown to rapidly. 
Comment