I now understood why people had been complaining about airport security. I had managed to help a friend find his seat on a service to Germany even though I wasn’t carrying a boarding pass myself. TPR had also followed us on-board. All sorted, we were just about to head back to the exit when the captain announced that the doors were secured and take-off was imminent. I called over a member of cabin staff in panic. It was imperative that I be released without delay so that I could return to organising the massive ceilidh at the top of the Mall in front of Buckingham Palace. The stewardess explained this would not be possible now that we were travelling non-stop to Washington DC (and not Germany, after all). By some miracle TPR and I already happened to have our passports on us. When I enquired about seating arrangements the stewardess asked me to look at the tiny corner of card in my hand. Perhaps things weren’t so bad after all: I had been allocated seat 1A.