Avoiding the Check In Blues
I suppose that most people would find Mrs FM & your humble correspondent really rather English - I mean, we are the sort of people that should we walk into a lamp post, will end up apologising to it. Whilst in my on case, accidents like this are normally preceeded by a prolonged bout of insobriety, I have no problems in apologising to lamp posts & frequesntly wonder why more people can't manifest better manners - even if they have to be alcohol induced ...
When confronted with the prospect of check-in at Heathrow's Terminal 4, you would have thought that this is the sort of situation that we would have taken in our stride & handled the queues in a very British fashion. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I mean, that level of shoddy organisation would not be tolerated in our average UN refugee camp! Worse than that, airport check-ins are one of those situations where Mrs FM's competative streak comes out - & as anyone that has ever sailed with her or raced against her can testify, the sheer aggression that she can summon up, if the situation merits it, is quite considerable. Yesterday was no different as she approached the job of getting on to our flight as a combinations of a 'command task' and the Royal Marines assault course.
So, we crossed the threshold into the Stygian dump that is the aforementioned terminal. As usual, the Lords of Chaos were firmly ensconced on their respective thrones; however, out of the corner of my eye I saw that imdomitable look come over the good lady wife's face & sure as sh*ts brown, we plotted a course directly for the rocks of confrontation.
Well, that is not exactly true ... queue for an hour & a half ... nope! Mrs FM steered us through in 15 mins via the express lane, using the flimsy excuse that there was a problem with the strip on my BA card & we couldn't use the E-Check.
Revelling in our inital success we were then confronted with the security check - you know the one where you queue for 20 mins to put your wallet & phone into a little tray so that someone can nick them the other side of the machine. Well, time for blag No.2 - the Mrs, bold as brass sails through the 1st class/VIP section with nothing more than a cheery wave to the bloke manning it & a "Well, you didn't look very busy...!"
Excellent - what a right royal result - total time from entering the terminal to sitting down with coofee & bacon sambos... 37 mins!!!
Not a bad start to the holiday - so, farewell to dear old blighty ... hello land of the free.
Comments
I bow, in awe and admiration.
(And yes, why is it airports are such shambolic nightmares? Surely people who can shecdule 100's of flights, 1000's of people, 10,000 of meals on every continent onthe planet, _simultaneously_, could manage to keep the terminals somewhat less chaotic.)
Posted by: Fred | August 13, 2004 6:41 PM
Cheers! If you have a couple of extra days, try to stop by Sweet Home Alabama...and more specifically, Auburn(God's country to me)
Posted by: Dan | August 14, 2004 6:18 AM
you must have had a great travel agent who smoothed your path - who was he?
Posted by: hugh | August 14, 2004 1:29 PM
Well, I've never apologised to a lamppost, but my fiancee complained once that I say "sorry" too often. Of course I apologised for that...
Love your site. Check out my blog for musings on fishing and shooting in California. It even has a link to FMFT!
Posted by: tom the pipers son | August 15, 2004 5:29 PM
Favourite phrase of this piece:
"Stygian dump"
Posted by: Mark | August 16, 2004 10:26 AM