Talking about wasting that you're never going to get back, I broke off working on the Hacker this afternoon and went to see the flight of what was billed as 34 Dakotas, filed with parachuter's flying in formation to Normandy to take part in the 75th anniversary of D day. They left Duxford and according to the NOTAM were to take off from Duxford, fly to Colchester and swing round and fly over Southend on Sea on towards Eastbourne. The route was shown and I thought that they would take the central route so we positioned ourselves in the middle deepest Essex down a farm track on top of a hill with a clear view and no hedge rows to get in the way, right under flightpath, or so I thought.
Not only ere they late taking off but they took the flight right down the far western side of the corridor allocated to them and then only the first 4 were in formation, the others were literally miles apart and so all we got was black dots in the sky away to the West of us
EDIT
To cap it all, the promised 34 never all arrived in the UK, only 24 did, and only 21 took part in the event, the others all went tech.