A little mouse with clogs on

I saw a mouse!
Where?
There on the stair!
Where on the stair?
Right there!
A little mouse with clogs on.
Well I declare!
Going clip-clippety-clop on the stair.
Oh yeah!

Sorry, I'm in a very whimsical mood today. I arrived in the sunny Netherlands this morning to do a couple of weeks' work. Thanks to Morgan, one of my cow-orkers on this project, we've all had clogs on the brain for two weeks leading up to coming out here. Which is a shameless stereotype, but that's Morgan for you. When he wanted a screenshot of the topology of our German network he emailed the request with the subject line "Schnitzel".

And sunny the Netherlands mostly certainly are, much like the rest of western Europe at the moment. It was certainly hot enough at home yesterday. Because I would have had to get up at stupid o'clock in the morning to get to Heathrow for my flight - 4:30am, to be precise, a time I normally only hear rumours about - I figured it was next to pointless to go to bed at all. Just as well anyway, as my house was like a Turkish bath last night. I would never have slept, just sweated a lot and sworn even more.

Nonetheless, having to set off that early blows goats, especially when the prick driving the 5:30am airport bus from Reading is one of those goons who takes every oppportunity to stomp on the goddamn brake with leaden feet when the bus is moving slowly, thereby pitching all the passengers forward and making me for one come perilously to puking my ring up all over the seat in front of me. Just as well I hadn't eaten for eight hours. And I'm fucking paying for this privilege.

Sorry, I forgot where I was a moment. That really wound me up. You may already have surmised that for yourself.

Permit me to offer you a recommendation, should you ever find yourself flying to the Netherlands. Don't fly KLM. At least don't fly on a KLM Exel service. The vessel in question is less a plane than a single-deck bus with wings and twin props. It's lavishly uncomfortable to travel in and when bowling down the Heathrow runway it felt noticeably less stable than my VW Beetle does at 120 mph down a backroad.

In fact, while I'm on the subject of airlines, permit me to offer another recommendation. Don't fly Air France either, or Terre France, as I've subsequently referred to them. Anywhere. Ever. Least of all to or from Paris. They couldn't organise an orgy in a knocking shop. When we were returning from Paris we were delayed by over two hours - which, for the avoidance of doubt, is significantly longer than the duration of the flight itself - because there was simply no plane to fly on. Forgive me for being picky, but isn't that the sort of thing an airline ought to be able to organise without undue difficulty? Not that we were given any explanation whatsoever for this until we were finally on the plane, whereupon we sat on the fucking tarmac for another half hour, also without explanation.

I will say however - looking for something positive on this subject - that the service level in general and the attitude and demeanour of the stewardesses in particular on my least favourite airline, British Airways, have improved beyond all recognition in the last six months and they are now a pleasure to fly with. I thought hell would freeze over, thaw out and freeze over again before I'd have ever cause to say that.