Finest hours

Iceland. What the heck are you playing at? I'd have thought you'd be trying to curry a little favour with your European colleagues, after that financial debacle last year. But no. You've sprouted a volcano, and now you're using it. Not just an ordinary volcano. Oh no. One with a very long and frankly rather unrealistic name. Like someone just typed a capital E, and then let their fingers tap randomly for 2 or 3 seconds on the keyboard. Like this: Easdofihweonasdlf;oahiewt;lan. But without the semi-colons.

You won't win the Eurovision Song Contest now. Not a hope. Not for decades.

Still, you should know the Brits. We go all Dunkirky at times like this, and start talking about "bringing our people home". Is Gordon Brown saying "oh for heaven's sake, I'm busy trying to win an election here"? No, he's not. He's saying "Get me my Spanish counterpart on the phone. Let's turn Spain into a British hub." Shouldn't be too hard. We've managed to turn plenty of Spain into Britain already. In fact, you might say it was a cunning slow-burning strategy, put in place over many years, one plate of egg and chips at a time, for just such a national emergency as this.

Fear not, oh Brits stranded abroad. I saw some of you interviewed today, and you said you were a bit worried about getting back from your exotic holiday for "some tests called SATS, which are quite important". But if you can get to Spain, which we'll rename Brit-hub for the time being, a flotilla of Royal Navy and requisitioned merchant navy vessels will brave the Bay of Biscay to come and get you. A flotilla, or perhaps we'd call it an armada, just for old time's sake. We wouldn't want you to miss your SATS.

Interestingly insular of you, though, Gordon, because you haven't thought about people who might be wanting to LEAVE Britain. You're assuming everyone is wanting to get IN. There may be some, believe it or not, who are wanting to get OUT. Like my husband for example. Can he hitch a ride with the Royal Navy, and then get a transatlantic flight out from Brit-hub? Just wondering.

In fourteen hundred and ninety-two,

Columbus sailed the ocean blue,

When we got as far as two thousand and ten,

We could have done with the Santa Maria* again.

I, on the other hand, did not have one of my finest hours when he phoned this morning to tell me that Delta have cancelled all flights till next week-end. It was early, and I hadn't had tea. Never a good time. I also had five children in the house (they were out of bed, I wasn't), since having failed to find a babysitter, I did the honourable thing and hosted a sleepover for the two children of a friend who was planning to leave hers on their own, and not stay out very late, and probably not enjoy the evening very much for wondering about them (hers are at that age, but only just).

Did I commend his valiant efforts - valiant but unnecessary, as it turns out - to retrieve his passport from the depot in Northants where the courier company's "express service" has left it to languish, en route from the US embassy to my mother's address? Did I sympathise with the frustration of scrambled travel plans? Did I call forth bravery in the face of the huge hassle that will surely ensue? Did I delicately weave together the two contrasting impressions that a wife needs to give a delayed absent husband, that the family is doing fine without him, but also not too absolutely fine. Or did I grunt monosyllabically, and mutter "fine, thanks" in reply to every question?

Wonder what Mrs Columbus would have been like if Christopher had had the use of an international phone line. "Bring back a bag of potatoes and we'll have chips for dinner. Oh, and pick up a packet of Marlboro Lights while you're at it." Hang on. Maybe that was Mrs Raleigh. Doh... I wish I was better at history.

* The Santa Maria was Columbus' ship - a historical detail which all US first graders know. It's like knowing Harold was hit by an arrow in the eye.

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