'Bing Bong! British Airways regrets to announce the cancellation of flight BA 123 to Paris which had been due to depart at 11.00am. Please listen for further announcements.'
Phew! After all the stress of packing, securing the house, travelling to the airport through endless traffic jams and just arriving in time for check-in, only to be greeted by the cancellation announcement.
What shall we do? Wait for further news, check in to a hotel, or go home. A harassed BA representative assures us that all is being done to transfer us on to another flight leaving much later in the day. We were only going for a weekend. Is it worth it?
'I've got to get to Paris today. My daughter is getting married tomorrow and I mustn't miss the wedding,' bleats a fellow passenger.
'It is essential that I get to my Board Meeting,' whines another chap.
We decide to get a coffee and review the situation. Lovely hot steaming coffee, comfortable chairs, relax for a moment. What must I look like after all that hassle. I'll go to the Ladies and freshen up. Taking my handbag with me I find the nearest toilet sign and enter. My handbag holds some make up so I open the central zip and find, to my dismay, that it does not contain our passports. Mild panic. Surely my husband has them.
I re-join him at the cafe and tentatively ask, 'Have you got the passports?'
'No,' he says, 'I thought you had them.' Decision is now made for us. We will have to go home.
After endless conversations and negotiations with British Airways, and another stressful journey, we finally arrive back home only to find the front door wide open! Have we been burgled? Nothing appears to have been disturbed. Nothing missing. Why was the door wide open? Has a member of our family been in. They all have keys. Several telephone calls later, and nobody owns up to having been to our house.
Is there something wrong with the lock? Seems to be functioning OK. In our hurry to get away, perhaps we didn't check that the door was closed.
Feeling rather vulnerable, we unpack and, having ensured the front door is well and truly closed and locked, we venture out to replenish the fridge and food cupboard as I had let the groceries run down.
When we return laden with groceries, we find, unbelievably, the front door is once again wide open. What a mystery! Who or what is doing this? Now I notice that the spare keys to my car, which I had hidden behind a vase of flowers, had been moved to the front of the hall table. We had travelled to the airport in my husband's car. My car is still sitting snugly under the carport and does not appear to be damaged in any way.
'Hello Mrs Rothwell.'A shout from the next door neighbour. 'I'm glad I found you in.'
'Hi, John.' I reply. 'Can you shed any light on our predicament. The front door is wide open and my car keys have been moved.'
Rather shamefacedly, he confesses, 'A long time ago, you let me have a spare front door key and I had actually forgotten I had it.' (So had I!)
'We had a bit of an emergency after you had left this morning,' he continued. 'One of my grandchildren had shut herself in the toilet in their house which is a couple of miles away and my daughter was panicking because she didn't know how to get her out.'
'I said I would go round to help her but when I went to get my car out, I found that somebody had parked half way over my driveway and I couldn't get my car through. Once again my daughter was ringing me because the child was now rather hysterical. I dug out your front door keys and found you car keys and jumped in to drive round to my daughter's house.
'When I got there I had to break the lock on the bathroom door to let my granddaughter out. She was sobbing and frightened and it took us time to calm her down. I then brought your car back and put it safely away but when I went to shut your front door, I couldn't seem to get the lock to work so I pulled the door almost shut and sent for a locksmith.
'The door must have blown open just before you came home.
'I didn't see you arrive back and go out again. While you were out the locksmith arrived by which time you had closed the front door. I opened it with your key and the locksmith said that, although it was very stiff, there was nothing wrong with the lock. I was just next door paying him for the unnecessary call-out when you arrived back with the shopping. I had not got round to locking your door.
'I'm so sorry that I had to worry you like this. I really was in a panic about my granddaughter and so was my daughter.'
We listened to his apologies but made it clear that it had given us quite a shock. He returned our front door key as he felt it was a responsibility he did not want to hold on to and we smiled and made reassuring noises while really wanting to rant at him for his rather inconsiderate behaviour. After all, he could have called a taxi.
Back indoors, I sank into an armchair and let out a sigh of relief. I wasn't happy about the neighbour borrowing my car and leaving the door open but at least no harm had been done.
I reached for my handbag, which I had bought especially for our weekend away, and noticed that one side of it was quite firm. Investigating, I found that there was another compartment which I had not really noticed. Senior moment. I undid the zip and staring up at me were our passports which had been with us all the time!