I learned two new things about me this holiday.
i) I am neither cool, calm nor collected in a 'situation'. In fact, I am a FLAPPER.
ii) My alcohol limit when air bound is significantly lower than normal. Stopping at, say, two bottles of rapidly necked wine is, in future, necessary in order to never again render my fellow passengers mute with horror as I snort-bark-squealed with laughter at children's films, swooned loudly at Javier Bardem and finally passed out in a drunken and no doubt snoring lump. Four bottles is greedy. Not festive.
These discoveries were borne out of England's inability to deal with snow. And we're talking inches here, not feet. Our green and pleasant was transformed into an icy tundra from as early as the end of November last year (hullo, Al Gore?) and subsequently morphed into a third world country. Buses ground to a halt, trains stopped running, the tube flopped over in pathetic defeat and more often then not people just stayed indoors. Typically British, we grumbled and sniped and moaned but similarly 'got on with it'. I, meanwhile, was basking in the sun over in the hot hemisphere, deliciously unaffected by the whole shambles aside from offering the occasional 'chin up' to friends and family who were losing small body parts to frost bite. I was due to fly back home for Christmas on the 20th of December. Plenty of time for the snow to melt, I thought. Bah humbug, said the weather.
So the 20th of December rolled around and I walked into work to be greeted by an ugly no-fly message on SAA's website.
BUT IT'S CHRISTMAS, I wailed. (Cancelling flights is not what Jesus would do.) The next flight I could get on was Christmas Eve. Well bollocks to that. The only reason I managed to get through the next few hours was a continuous flow of caffeine swiftly followed by large glasses of wine. Sneaking onto the website around lunchtime it appeared that they were flying as normal, after all. Hurrah, I cheered. (Or it could have been more of a woozy whoop as I crashed forwards into my desk by that point.) I immediately cheered up and began planning what order I was going to eat my Christmas food in, day dreaming about mulling any alcohol I could lay my hands on and how frequently I could eat cheese for 'pudding'. Happy days. By 4 o'clock the website said they were off again, the robotic lady voice on the phone said they were on and I was getting indigestion with the confusion of it all. I drove anxiously to the airport, dragging my ancient, 'at least no-one will steal it' bag behind me to be told that yes, my flight was cancelled. Sorry. They would know by 2pm the following day if they would fly or not and, in the meantime, it was best really to hang around until then. I looked at the air stewardess and for a split second imagined yanking her over coiffed 'do sharply downwards so her lipsticked mouth smashed into the desk.
And then I cried.
Crying, friends, is magical. It makes people UNCOMFORTABLE. And when people are UNCOMFORTABLE they tend to go out of their way to do anything and everything to make you stop crying. Her eye twitched and she swallowed nervously, brushing imaginary wrinkles off her blazer. Bingo.
So I totally got on a flight. The ONLY flight leaving the country for England. God bless that glorious, overly made-up air stewardess. I want to say I'm not proud but I sort of am. I didn't bump anyone else off, just took a seat that someone, in all the confusion, didn't pitch up for. I did hit a small child in the face with my handbag as I sprinted, red faced and panting, through the airport though. Did feel a smidge guilty about that and his subsequent wail but I was not missing that plane.
This is the part where I ignore the need for a refreshing glass of water and instead thirstily guzzle copious bottles of wine. I became quite loud. I chatted animatedly to my neighbour. I snorted with glee at the in-flight entertainment.
AND THEN I GOT GROPED.
God was clearly watching when I walloped that small child. Apparently my seemingly shy and retiring neighbour, a spotty and rather smelly Afrikaans youth on his first trip to the UK, thought that, though I was drunkenly snoring, my body was screaming STROKE ME. Dozily emerging from my wine induced coma to be greeted by a moist-palmed paw clutching at my arm was immensely sobering. However, I am English, which meant I was absolutely incapable of leaning over and telling him where to shove it. Instead I mock woke up in an overly exaggerated way, complete with disorientated/I just had a horrible nightmare noise. (I may have been a little drunk still.) He looked at me earnestly like a small puppy and I wondered how him and my arm could have formed such an intense relationship in such a short space of time, before giving him a wobbly smile (you know, the kind you reserve for drunk homeless men who lurch towards you on the tube shouting about the aliens in their head) and dragging my rug between us to form some kind of barrier. Needless to say the rest of my flight was pretty nightmarish as my premature hangover bashed me over the head and I simultaneously strained away from Gropey, tattooing the arm rest into my left hand side and cricking my neck.
Oh (ho ho) but it doesn't stop there. After landing, running away from Gropey, collecting my bag
and enjoying a wonderfully cliche-ridden Christmas holiday full of log fires, scrabble battles, crumbly stilton, snowy dog walks, endless bottles of Merlot and tangerine smelling fingers I made my way back to the station to get to the airport. What's that? The train's been cancelled last minute because of overhead line problems and I'll need to take a round-the-houses replacement train before connecting somewhere else only to be picked up by a train that will similarly be delayed meaning I have to leg it (a - gain) through London, followed by a bag that will surrender it's rickety wheels to a snowy pavement, meaning I arrive at the boarding gate nine minutes after closing and subsequently miss my flight home?
Oh fuck this.
*** Here's to a 2011 of smooth travelling and, if not, guardian angels in the form of garishly made up air stewardesses that melt when you cry and move mountains to get you on planes ***
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