Irritability

Strong winds mean the flight to London is delayed. Angus has a chance to linger in the airport shops and marvel at the products on offer.

The airport has recently had a major makeover. Now you are channelled through an arcade of brightly lit stores before you get to the boarding gates. This being Toulouse there is an emphasis on rugby products or Airbus paraphernalia. 

London is supposed to be wet but turns out to be mercifully dry. The new poke, pound, pummel and prod surgeon is punctual - to the minute. He is wearing a duck egg blue golf jumper and a check shirt. This look manages to combine sartorial elegance with the air of a man who has just finished playing nine holes. He uses the word 'pain' rather than the more reassuring euphemism 'manageable discomfort'. After ten minutes the duck egg blue surgeon moves on to discussing his fees. This distracts Angus from the 'manageable discomfort'.

Over dinner the serious Manhattanites are given a tour of 2020. Constitutional crisis, climate change and the Chinese conundrum. The six 'C's. They seem happy enough.

The first British Airways flight home is full of middle age men off on a weekend rugby trip. Gloucester is playing Toulouse. The middle age men are of the jolly sort who arrive at the aircraft galley and shout down to their mate on row 22  'Are you on the plane Harry ?'. Angus feels like telling them to believe the evidence of their own eyes and leave the rest of us in peace. One of the side effects of the new pills prescribed by the golfing surgeon is 'irritability'.

Back at home Sophie gives her master a ' Where do you think you've been  ? ' look that makes it plain that irritability is not the sole preserve of her master. She settles for a lengthy and noisy reunion.