Back from Helsinki

Basics: Alive
Employment: Just left contract.
Up for drinks: Not this weekend, thank you.
Residence: Sussex, England
Up coming events: give me a break, I've only just returned from Finland.

Yesterday I arrived at Vantaa, Helsinki's airport, in plenty of time. I did my statutory mooch around the duty free shops but there was nothing I felt like buying.

So, I went to the gate and sat next to a rather nice looking blonde. Well, why not?

In a rather nonchalant fashion - I like to think - I unzipped one of the pockets of my cabin bag. I wanted to fish out a book to pretend to read whilst thinking up a non-cheesy chat up line (if there's such a thing).

Anyway, looking into the pocket I saw a pair of flight socks looking back at me (I know, not even flight socks actually look at people).

I really should wear these socks, even for short flights. Probably even for elevator trips to the top floor of buildlings.

"Bother" was a word I could have used.

I dragged my bag off to the toilets to change socks. I put the bag on the toilet seat whilst I undid the padlock on the main part of the bag.

That's when it all went terribly wrong.

The keys slipped away from the padlock onto the the porcelain, at the back of the seat. As I went to retrieve them, I was careful not to push them so they'd slip all the way under the seat into the bowl. But they did, oh bloody yes.

I raised the seat and looked at the bottom of the bowl. The keys were there looking back at me (yes, I know they weren't really looking, but they were taunting me). I grabbed the toilet brush and tried to retrieve them using it. No success.

Now, I felt it was quite important to retrieve these keys. Although I have duplicates, some were back at home and I didn't want something else to go wrong which would prevent me getting into the house. But there was no way I was going to put my hand into the bowl - which had been flushed and looked quite clean - and retrieve them.

No way.

Except.

One of the advantages of being a single bloke is that you're expected to carry condoms in your wallet. Now I had wanted to use at least one of the condoms for more interesting activities but why not use it as an improvised glove?

This I did, inserting my hand into it whilst trying not to stretch it open. Then, using my fingers I dragged the keys out of the water.

I then noticed something which hadn't happened to me before as I'm very careful about the types of condoms I buy. It had split. Clearly, they're not to be used for rescuing keys from toilet bowls.

I threw the keys into the sink and using large amounts of soap washed them and my hands. In fact I ripped off my shirt (which had been splashed a bit) and washed my forearms - scrubbing up style before an operation. Soap is an anitseptic and I didn't have any cuts on my hands or arms so the chance of infection was very low. And most of the condom had remained intact covering most of my hand.

I had a feeling that things could get worst. As in the police kicking open the door and asking why I had an opened up condom in the toilets. Alone. My Finnish wouldn't be up to answering this level of questioning; all I could say in such a situation would be "Minä olen englantalaien".

So I very, very carefully disposed of the condom. Then I washed my hands and arms and the keys again. And once I dried them off, I washed them again.

Finally I retrieved my last clean shirt from the cabin bag and put it on. And I sprayed on some eaue de toilette.

A few minutes later it was as if nothing had happened. I left the toilets, and returned to my seat. The blonde had long gone. Pity. I still had a spare condom.