The entire cost for the round trip was two cents Ts&Cs included as a result of Ryanair's recent free seats sale - the charge looks so odd on my credit card bill [:0] Aer John dropped me off a couple of hours before the flight and although I went to an empty check-in desk I somehow managed to score sequence 101 on my boarding card. In ORK they pre-populate the cards and then hand-write the name! Not to worry - the magic 1-90 for early boarding has been superceded by those who have chosen to pay for Priority Boarding/OLCI and the rest of the plebs have been consigned to the area once reserved for sequence number 91-189. As usual the line forms the minute the wheels of the incoming aircraft touches the tarmac [:0] but I chose to wait until nearly everyone had boarded. I still managed to score a window seat and no-one else beside me in spite of being nearly the last one on!
It was on the return flight that things got a bit interesting. I checked in with furry tongue and a reasonably clear head (Note to self: Next time a niece mentions 40th birthday parties, run like the clappers in the opposite direction, especially if she has a toddler daughter guaranteed to wake at cock crow) and in spite of once more being the last to board scored a window seat and an empty row near the back of the plane. We won't mention the mother who gave her child a whistle to play with - you know the kind, the ones with a slide that you pull out so that it makes different 'notes' in order to 'keep him quiet' [:0] If the flight had been longer than 35 minutes infanticide would have seemed very attractive. No, what was interesting was that just as we had started to taxi there was a sudden movement behind me and the passengers in the last four rows of the plane were being sent further forward to other seats. So there we were bumping along towards the runway and a bevy of passengers wandering around the cabin, especially as some of them were dithering as to whether to re-stow their carry-on luggage [:0] Obviously they had been asked to move because of the trim of the aircraft but I found it very disconcerting and had visions of them still wandering around as we took off. Fortunately they were all seated by then. Phew!!
