• What bachelor wants with hot hostess and what is offered are miles apart
Diary,
I consider myself a highly educated man, although I did only learn the other day that a crocodile cannot stick its tongue out and that a shrimp’s heart is in its head. In its head. How about that, right?
But you see, learning about a croc’s tongue or a shrimp’s heart doesn’t quite rock my boat (or your boat) one way or the other. Some other things you don’t know… those can come to bite you in the caboose.
Once my medical conference in Chicago is over, I thank my host Dr Johnson and his family and board my first of three connecting flights back home. The first is a Swedish airline. Not that it matters. The important thing is that Klara is a steward on this plane. Also important is a nameless numbskull who happens to sit across the aisle and a few seats in front of me.
Mr Numbskull does all the things you shouldn’t do in a plane, like asking for service immediately after boarding, or fighting to use the bathroom as the plane is taking off, or pressing the call bell every two minutes, which keeps bringing Klara over. And when Klara comes over, Mr Numbskull uses language I’m loathe to repeat in polite society.
So, on one of the many trips Klara makes down the aisle, I too press the call bell and she comes over, looking none too pleased.
‘How may I help you?’ she asks, but I can tell she wants nothing more than to kick Mr Numbskull’s and my caboose.
‘I only called to ask a question. Is Klara Swedish?’
‘Pardon?’
‘Is Klara Swedish for angel? Because no human can be as tolerant as I’ve seen you be.’
After a few seconds she laughs. ‘I don’t know if that’s the world’s lamest pickup line or the poorest attempt at consolation.’
‘Can it be both?’
And that’s how it starts. How it ends, will shame me for the rest of my life.
After she brings my meal, Klara whispers in my ear, ‘Tom, how would you like to join the mile-high club? Come to the crew quarters after your meal.’
Since I don’t do drugs, I decide to ignore Klara’s invitation. Not until I narrate the story to my colleague does he tell me, ‘You are such a doofus. The mile-high club means sex on a plane.’
Yes, some things you don’t know can bite you in the caboose.