Astrid

You won't be surprised to hear that I'd have happily spent another full day in Berlin but we didn't even have time for breakfast, this morning. Some last minute shopping - curry wurst for the Minx's sister - and then a train to the airport...

... which was packed! By the time we were through security, there was no time for a drink, just a dash to the gate. But I have to say that the flight home was the best I've had in forty years.

When I was young, we flew a lot. Not so much before going to Hong Kong - I think we had one holiday in Majorca - but certainly between the ages of eight and twelve we flew a lot. And although for some reason I threw up virtually every time we took off or landed (and bear in mind there were three stop offs between London and Hong Kong) I still enjoyed flying.

When I was sixteen, though, my Scout troop did some kind of exchange with the local Air Scouts and I was taken up in a light aircraft. I bloody hated every minute and couldn't wait to be back on the ground. But even then, I didn't realise I'd gone off flying. That realisation came and the age of twenty-four when we flew to Portugal on honeymoon. It was as the plane went to take off that I realised I was terrified.

From then on, I found every flight a nightmare, but fortunately I didn't fly that often, usually just once a year to Austria at Easter, to join my burgeoning family on a skiing holiday with my wife's family. And that was enough. 

But when I was working in Edinburgh in 2001, I was asked to manage a similar project in London. Monday and Tuesday in England, Wednesday to Friday in Scotland. I was quite flattered by this and readily agreed before realising this meant two aeroplane flights every week. 

So, I'd fly down every Monday morning - leaving very early for the airport post-9/11 - and back on a Tuesday evening. Except the ladies in the project office would, despite my protestations, book my taxi to the airport for 2pm, "just in case the traffic's bad". Thus, I'd spend the Tuesday afternoon in the bar at City Airport, waiting for my 6pm flight, reading my book and enjoying a few beers.

One week, I was sat there, two pints in, enjoying, if I remember correctly, an Iain Banks novel, when I heard a familiar voice say "Hello, Fenner. Fancy seeing you hear!". It was the programme manager, also heading from London to Edinburgh. And so it was that I spent the rest of the afternoon and the flight back with him.

And what a flight it was! Bumpy and noisy, and we came into Edinburgh at an alarming angle. And yet, because I was busy making (reluctant) conversation with him I didn't experience any the horrors that I would normally have. And it was from there that I began to feel better about flying. 

Meeting the Minx, who *hates* flying, should have been a set back; her bizarre habit of sitting in the departure lounge watching crosswind landings on YouTube should have regressed me back to those primal fears but, funnily, they never have. Today's flight was a dream. I finished the Robert Galbraith book as we landed and realised that at no point had I made any emotional or physiological adjustment for the fact we were flying.

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Reading: Book 27: ‘Lethal White’ by Robert Galbraith. I’d been told this was the best book in the Strike series (so far), so I saved it for Berlin. I started it on the train from Chorley to Manchester Airport on Monday and finished it as we touched down on the way home, today. It was (along with the Minx) a brilliant companion all the way through the trip. I was so sad to finish it, even as I gulped my greedy way through the final chapters.