Easy Jet rules

Looking back over my previous blogs, I remembered the one I wrote whilst trying to purchase plane tickets for our holiday to Portugal. This reminded me of the hell that was Gatwick on that sunny morning that we flew out there.

Coming from so far away, and being naturally nervous flyers, we always arrive at least five hours early. Our children moan like hell, but have grown to accept that this is just the way it is and always will be, forever and ever, Amen.

So, we had a coffee and a mooch around and did a spot of people watching (the large girl in the leopard skin jumpsuit being the most entertaining) before deciding to queue up. We were still very early, at least two hours before our flight left, but the queue we joined practically went all the way back to Devon. We were tired. We were grumpy, and both my husband and I were getting those jitters that a fear of flying produces before you even get on the plane. When you start reaching for the worry beads and thinking that, actually, you do believe in God after all.

We had hardly progressed at all having waited for an hour, when our flight was actually called, so we were directed to the front by the harrassed looking staff, who were trying to make some order out of the chaos.

Finally, we got to the check out. Now, due to my computer incompetence, and the lack of clarity of the Easy Jet website, I had done three separate bookings. The first was supposed to be for four of us, but ended up having only my name on it, so I'd done another for my husband and two children, and a third when our other child finally decided he could come too (I find you can always persuade your grown up children to come on holiday with you if you pay for them. Call it bribing, but it works every time).

I had paid for two bags on the first booking, and not added any subsequent bags on the other bookings because both our sons travel light and could manage with only hand luggage, and my daughter was persuaded that she didn't need any evening dresses, evening shoes, or half a ton of makeup, since we were so broke having paid for the holiday, we would not be going out at all.

Feeling quite smug that we'd managed to limit our weight to 40 kgs, I was astounded when the lady told us we were some 7 kilos overweight.

'How can that be?' I protested, the panic rising like bile inside me, as I calculated the cost of this. She explained, slowly, and several times, that you only got 20kgs per booking, and so we could have only 20kgs for the whole lot of us, even though I had paid for two bags, anc clearly all of our stuff was distributed between them. Eventually, I understood, and conscious of the queue of people still waiting to check in behind us, we started to try and cram as much into the boys' rucksacks as possible, but only got it down by about 3kgs, with the rucksacks threatening to burst at the seams.

She must have seen the hot flush come whooshing up into my face, and the caffeine induced shaking hands (causing the children to temporarily disown me) for eventually she took pity on us and shoved one of the bags over onto another of the bookings. I couldn't help wonder why she hadn't done this straight away, since it was obvious we were all one family.

Still, I was eternally grateful.