Putting on a brave face

Here's a question for you.

You're on a long trip with your family in, say, Australia. You're going to be gone for a while, perhaps 5 weeks? And since you have two children with you, you have a fair amount of luggage.

Your husband is Packing King (or he thinks so, at any rate). You leave him to it - after getting everything that needs to be packed washed, ready, and in one easily accessible place. The not-so-tidy pile of essential 'stuff' is transformed into one supersized suitcase, one normal, and a lot of smaller bags (most of which get stowed in the bottom of the buggy at check-in in an attempt to fool the girl on the desk that no, you don't have more than one piece of hand luggage per person...)

Now, you are not a shallow individual. You set spiders free rather than washing them down the toilet or sucking them up into the hoover. You buy The Big Issue. You take your unused clothes and grown-out of toys to Oxfam. OK, you may have a couple of overdue library books knocking about, but really, you're a pretty grounded sort of person.

So when, on an internal flight in Australia, you are forced to shed a couple of kilos from the leviathon suitcase you have with you because it's come in at a tad over the limit for a single piece of luggage, you sigh inwardly but don't balk at using the attractive woven plastic blue and white excess baggage they hand you at the check-in desk.

Yes, admittedly you roll the top over, so that as little of it is on view as possible when you board the plane with it as hand luggage. But you smile bravely, telling yourself that once the flight is over you can use it as a laundry bag for the rest of the trip, and that it never need be seen in public again. Particularly since you have a very handy Cath Kidston beach bag with you that would have done the same job perfectly - and a great deal more stylishly - if it hadn't been packed right at the bottom of another bag. By the Packing King.

But, you put it behind you. I mean, you don't actually know anyone in Australia, right?

But, on the next flight, guess what? Your super-double-plus-bag-with-wings is overweight again. And which receptacle has Packing King kept handy, just in case?

I think you know, don't you?


FYI, the weight limit is 32 kilos, if you must know. OK, I admit it. Supersized suitcase weighed 35 kilos. I knew I should never have taken those brown high-heeled boots... And be warned; come next year BA are dropping the maximum weight to 23 kilos for a single piece of luggage (which resulted in what was very nearly a blue fit at Sydney airport before we realised this rule hadn't actually come into effect yet). If I were a suspicious person I might think that is in order they can charge you for taking 2 pieces of luggage rather than one....