Just when you think you're safe....

We're back! Twenty one hours after leaving my folks, we're safely ensconced in our home in Edinburgh. I'd be lying if I said it was a walk in the park... Heck, I'd even be lying if I said it was a poo in the park. The first leg of our journey from Boston to Frankfurt wasn't too bad, we left at ten at night when the kids were good and demented so they slept most of the flight. I had barf bags at the ready in case Maia decided to projectile vomit in my face like last time. Unfortunately I was so focused on the threat of vomit from below that I took my eye off the ball and didn't realise the true danger was vomit across the aisle, courtesy of a fully-grown stranger. She hurled and hurled into the aisle between our seats to the extent that a doctor was summoned and she was put on oxygen, probably just to plug up her mouth and make her stop. The flight crew dumped about four kilos of coffee grounds onto the spill, I'm not entirely sure why but it was probably just the shock of the whole thing. I was largely delirious with fatigue during the excitement, and could have probably put it down to a bad dream had my shoes not been vomitted on. Which I found out in the morning when I put them back on. Nice.

Once at Frankfurt, we had a layover of almost six hours. Let me repeat that: we had a layover of almost six hours. Thankfully, Frankfurt is probably the biggest airport in the world, so we spent a lot of those six hours going from our arrival to departure terminals. Maia also helpfully refused to walk at all, so it took even longer for me to carry her, her backpack, and my backpack across the expanse. So we really only had four hours to kill, which is totally not a big deal when you've had three hours of sleep.

The real trouble started when we were descending from our Frankfurt flight into Edinburgh. Maia had spent the whole flight on my lap, arms wrapped around me like a little koala. When the flight attendant came around to say she needed to be buckled into her own seat I pretended I couldn't hear him. When he repeated that she needed to be moved, I pleaded with my eyes, 'Don't make me do this'. Those of you who know a bit about koalas will know that despite being cute, they're also crazy and nasty. And sure enough, when they insisted she be prised from my lap, Maia went feral. She became a yowling, thrashing mess of teeth and claws. It took supernatural strength for me to hold her down in the seat as she continuously locked her legs in a standing position, bit any appendage that got within range, pulled out clumps of my hair and scratched my face. On the plus side, there was far too much going on for me to make eye contact with any of the horrified passengers, who surely would have been phoning Social Services or Rabies Control had mobiles been allowed. This continued for the full thirty minute decent, when she promptly turned into Sweetness and Light, clapped and pretended nothing happened. After sheepishly kissing my arm and saying 'Sorry'.

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