It's the early hours of Sunday morning on 21st December. What's more, this time I have a pen! "This time" what? you might inevitably ask. I'm in an airport of course, and if I'm in an airport then I must be at a loose end and so the mind tends to occupy itself.

Actually, that's not so true this time, as I've just spent the last couple of hours in what passes for Riyadh's business/first class lounge, physically attached to the iPod, but mentally more attuned to John Irving's 'The Fourth Hand'. His books are bizarre make no mistake, but you'd only have had to have read one to know that. I've read a fair sample of them now and they never fail to entertain - other passengers must wonder what's got into me, as I'm sure I wear a permanent smirk on my face.

Not at the moment though, as I've moved out of the rather cloying lounge and into the hive of activity also known as Costa Coffee and as always, the joint is just bouncing like a regular rubber ball. There is the merest hint that passengers are shifting irresistably towards the gate, but Costa Coffee and I are not to be parted just yet.

It's a well known fact that the majority of the world's airports are not designed to accommodate the average human form - I cite in evidence the chairs. Is it possible they could have been created with the purpose of supporting a vaguely humanoid shape for in excess of two hours? The ones here are surely only an intermediate manufacturing step on the way to a particularly exotic (and no doubt expensive) brand of cheese grater. Very good for aeration though so I'm told.

I see the lines a forming, so Costa and I must part company. Another short but torrid relationship must end with a journey...