Serene glide on the tram sees unfrazzled and stress-free arrival

It’s not often anyone writes anything positive about the Edinburgh Trams, so here goes. I took the tram to the airport on Wednesday morning to catch a flight to Amsterdam where I am doing shows this weekend.

It was an early-morning departure, but I decided to get the bus into town and jump on the tram, which glided serenely along Princes Street and I arrived for my flight unfrazzled and stress-free. Unlike my previous nightmare trip to the airport. Taking a flight to Berlin last year, I phoned for a taxi. The automated switchboard told me it would arrive in 15 minutes. Thirty minutes later it still had not arrived so I phoned again to be told that it was on its way. Two further phone calls later, there was still no sign so I phoned again, and this time spoke to an actual person who said it would be 20 minutes. This was going to be too late to catch my flight, so the only alternative was to drive to the airport which should get me there OK, traffic permitting.

The traffic was awful, and I reached the airport 30 minutes before take off. This meant the only way I was going to catch the plane was if I parked in the short stay car park. For four days. That swallowed up most of the fees for my gigs in Berlin.

There were a couple of hiccups on this week’s journey, the first being the ridiculous combined washer-dryer taps in the toilets at Edinburgh Airport. You may have seen these things. They are shaped like an aeroplane and dispense both air and water. You always end up blowing air onto soap-filled hands. Every time I use them I think, “what idiot invented this thing?”

The second blip was the huge queue at border control at Schiphol Airport. While the EU citizens were able to swan through the automatic gates, holders of UK passports had to line up for half an hour. Boris Johnson told us Brexit was about “taking back control” and was cheered on by supporters in the business community such as James Dyson.

Who’s he? He’s the idiot that invented those daft hand dryers. Thanks to him, we can’t even take back control of washing our hands.