Following a recent later summer break this absurd adult made a few notes about the rare and strange eccentricities that occur along the way. If you find it funny, tell me, if it sounds familiar maybe you are just as absurd as we all are.

Prepare for the journey

The week before

Get suitcases down from the loft. Trip over them every night for a week. Tell everyone you are not in work because of your planned holiday. Humble brag about how difficult it will be because it is already 40 degrees there and it’s only 9am. If you are staying in a villa, make sure to tell people about all the facilities, especially if it has a private pool. Staying in hotel? Tell people it is where your favourite celebrity always stays, even if you can’t back that up.

Iron all your clothes then fold them into a suitcase, carefully reintroducing every crease. Wear them anyway hoping ‘the humidity’ will deal with them. It won’t. Realise last minute you have forgotten your trainers. Cram them in on top of your clean clothes.

Download a copy of your ticket to your phone, your partners phone and the children’s phone. Decide you don’t trust any of them with the tickets including yourself. Print them off three times. Check you still have the copies every ten minutes until you reach the check in desk.

Day of travel

Book a taxi to drop you at the airport three days in advance so you don’t miss the flight. Wait at the airport because bag drop doesn’t open until 3 hours before the flight. Argue with your partner about why you always get there too early. Camp out at the airport living off pretzels and cola for two days.

Checking in

Check your own bag in, add the luggage label and carry it to the conveyer belt. Realise you have been duped into doing all the work that you have paid the airline to deliver. Notice the smirk on the staff members face when they look at your passport photo. When they hand it back to you, wait five minutes, check that you still have your passport.

Be forced to abandon your £100 aftershave/ perfume at the customs desk due to liquid carry on rules. Purchase the same bottle at duty free straight afterwards.

Dump the large bottle of water just before customs after forgetting the customs rule again. Buy water at Boots straight after customs. Get a meal deal separately on your way to Burger King.

Next head straight to the bar for a pre holiday pint, even though it’s only 5am ‘because you are on your holidays’. Forget that all the fizz in the lager makes you swell up like a hippo on the plane.

Hope that no one sits next to you on the flight, even though you chose a 3 seat format when there’s only 2 of you travelling during peak season. Glare at everyone who comes past until a crumpled looking parent sits down next to you. Decide you are going to make friends with them when they do sit down. Nod at them once, then ignore them for the duration of the flight, except when you need the toilet. They will be asleep at this point. Wait for the stewardess to ram the trolley into their knee as they go past and seize the opportunity to get up then. On your return from the toilet spend 30 minutes following the trolley down the aisle as everyone else gets their refreshments.

Arrival

Panic about getting stopped at customs even though you have done nothing wrong. Heave a sigh of relief once through for no reason. Lose all your family as they get their bag searched. Try not to look smug about it.

Find your luggage is the last bag to be sent through on the baggage reclaim conveyer belt, probably because yours was the first to be loaded onto the plane, having arrived too early. Have another argument with your partner about it. Stand with your arms folded looking at the same bag (not yours) going round the conveyer belt for the 15th time. Consider taking that bag with you as well.

Buy a book that was recommended at the airport. Read two pages and discover you have already read it. When you get to your accommodation, notice that there are 6 copies of the same book already there.

Time to enjoy your Holiday

Now you have eventually arrived it’s time to relax and enjoy the sunshine. Make sure to tell everyone you don’t get sunburned. Get burned on the first day, badly. Blame the sun tan cream you didn’t use for being defective. Spend the next two weeks at various stages of pain, weeping blisters and skin peel. Ensure that you are back to the same colour just before you return home.

Go on a trip to see the turtles. Immediately feel guilty as 5 huge boats packed with tourists surround a single nonplussed turtle. See seven turtles passing the boat on the way back, looking like they are laughing at you. See a pod of dolphins who are definitely laughing at you because you are sunburnt.

Take 20 beautiful outfits for a 7 day trip. Realise on the first night that no one gets dressed up anymore. Buy shorts and a vest top from the market for 5 euros to fit in and wear that every day instead because it’s too hot.

Complain loudly about how bad karaoke night is. Get drunk and do karaoke, badly.

Each evening ensure to leave all windows wide open and invite every mosquito in the country for an all night biting party at your expense. Slap your own itchy legs at 3am. Scream because they are still suburned.

Buy several postcards with the intent of sending them to you relatives. Struggle to find a working biro and tell yourself you will just hand post them once you are back. Forget to do it and three weeks after your holiday ends, just put them in the bin.

Returning home

Once back at the airport make sure to spend all your remaining currency on duty free. Once the flight is inevitably delayed, realise you have no currency left to buy anything to eat.

Once on the flight, find yourself sat next to the same person you ignored for four hours previously. Ask them if they had a nice holiday, then ignore them for the remainder of the flight.

Realise you have left your phone charger back at the apartment. Take it out on everyone around you even thought you packed your own belongings.

When the Captain announces that it is colder at home than it was on your holiday, listen for the sounds of shock emanating from your fellow passengers. When the plane eventually lands tut loudly when some people at the back start clapping. Bang your head on the overhead lockers as soon as you stand up.

The morning after

Tell your partner several times an hour, ‘this time yesterday we were on a sunbed’. Complain about how cold you are and that there is no milk in the fridge. If you see any of your neighbours tell them what time you got home. They will already know of course, because they heard you.

By the evening be completely fed up with not being on holiday anymore, ask your partner why you don’t live in a hot country and start making plans for your next holiday, preferably to return to exactly the same resort. Order a takeaway of food you could easily have bought on your holiday despite the fact that you had fish and chips every night. Tell everyone it isn’t as good as the one you had on holiday (even though you didn’t). Get drunk on the duty free you brought back then turn up to work the next day horribly hungover. Tell everyone it was food poisoning from your holiday.