I never buy peanuts on an airplane. The peanut industry has always seemed fairly low key, unprepossessing, pretty run of the mill and nothing to be too alarmed by, in general terms, so why do airline companies feel the need to introduce a 33g packet? At that tiny size the weight of the thin and yet hardly penetrable aluminium packet starts to count compared to the weight of the individual nut, and indeed the price per gram has as much to do with the aluminium mining industry as it does the world of the nut. Even the salt needs to be factored in at that size. So if you see me on a plane eating peanuts you know it's a bad day. But nothing else goes with Southern Comfort and airport lemonade, and if you see me with one of those, expect some nuts because it must have been a very bad day indeed.

My hands were trembling as I tried to open the stupidly barricaded plane infra-portion of the salty carbohydrates. Peanuts are the only naturally produced supply of mono-sodium glutamate. Did you know that? Taste enhancers, they are, and good ones. But the plane ones were mostly a challenge to me, an act of defiance, to myself, by myself.

I drew a deep breath, hands limp on my lap, the packet unchallenged as yet. A respite between us both. Me trying to gather my self control, the peanuts making it difficult, business as usual.

You might think that peanuts shouldn´t have such a hold on me, and you might be right. But you don't know what lead me to this tiny tactical act of self control. you don't know about the bidet.

Now bidets are another problem entirely, and I'm sure you agree. An ideal place for cleaning ones feet, right up until that moment during teenhood when you learn in a flash of perspicacity that they are, in fact, for cleaning the nether regions of ladies. This puts a whole new spin on the bathroom scene, and I swear that moment of comprehension is the coin toss that leads some people to consider bathroom activities a replacement for sex. Or so the internet has lead me to believe.

But this was not about bidets in general. This was about that bidet, and it took me by surprise, it really did. Really. Let's backtrack.

I arrived at the hotel in Bundaberg cooly enough. I got through the usual challenge of reception by speaking as little as possible and getting ready to tolerate the string of irrelevant questions the receptionists always tag on to what should be a simple transaction.

"I booked a room, the name is Johnson, Calvin Johnsson"

Now, I know what you're thinking. I misspelled my name there, at least once. I did. I do it mentally. I always do it. I know, for a fact, that reception has 7 different spellings, and although i spell mine the usual way, they would invariably alight on the wrong one. By now I feel it serves me right for having such a potentially dull name, and I always say my name twice when giving it to someone, and I always have a mental image of an alternative spelling for the second one. the game is to see if i got there mistake right.

"Yes Mr. Jonson, you are in room two fourteen. May I have your passport please?"

See that? He said it without the 'h'. you might think that I shouldn't be able to tell, but I can. This guy was erring on the simple, and I had given him too much credit with my guess. Johnsson with two 's's? Nah, too humdrum for that. That's Brisbane. I should have known.

I scan the receptionists eyes for tell-tale signs of guilt as he reads my passport. I like to catch their eyes doing the double take. "Ah shit" they seem to say, as well they might. This guy was on top of it, though. He didn't bat an eyelid, and I didn't catch him correcting anything on the computer either. Playing it cool. Ok, I can handle that.

"Would you like breakfast in your room, sir?"

I have been asked this question a hundred times, but in my head the answer is always "What? But it's evening!". I wasn't expecting such a question in this small suburban family-run kind of place, but I don't want this guy to think I am anything other than a rock, and frankly by then I was dying for a pee, so I just say:

"Please."

"That'll be 75 dollars?" he asks. He should know, and I pay up without fuss. Cash is fast and precludes long waits and chit chat.

"Okay, thanks for that, here are your keys? It's on the second floor? The lift is just over there?"

So many questions, and surely I am not the one to answer them. But I have been in Australia for a year and the rampant over use of the questioning tone is clearly just there way of self-doubting, and I let it slide. Also, the idea of toilet is overpowering my brain, and my back teeth must be floating by now.

"Thanks" and I am away, over to the lift, up to the second floor, fiddling with the lock of the door to the room. I get into the room and get to remove my stinky rotten shirt, ready to lunge at the bathroom to sit down and collect my thoughts. Yes, I sit down and pee, but only in hotel rooms, and only on arrival. It helps me get over the awkward world of hotel receptions. I locate the bathroom down a short corridor at the other end of the room.

As my eyes alight on the door that will solve everything, I realize I have left my only suitcase downstairs at reception. Not to worry. I can handle this. There is no way I am going to put that clammy filthy shirt on again, and I must go to the toilet, but the rules say I must be done with arriving before that special moment of redemption. I see a phone by the bed, I pick it up and dial 0. I hear a dialling tone. What now? Cursed hotel phone systems. I hang up and scrabble around for a clue on how to get reception, that smarmy, too sure of himself bloke downstairs who seemed to know it all in advance. I flip over leaflets and brochures, digging for instructions. I am about to go crazy and wet myself right there when I jog the phone with a brochure on water-skiing and see the hand-written piece of paper, taped on to the table under the phone. Dial 7 for reception.

"Hello, reception?" he says to me and I swear he must be messing with me. I was just going to say just that when he beat me to it. I pause, but my bladder won't let me stall for long.

"Hi, yes, this is room 214?" Oh no, now I'm doing it.

"I think you left your bag down here?" quizzes the man, a mind reader too apparently, although not so sure of his own mind if his constant barrage of question tones is anything to go by. However, yet again he has taken the words out of my mouth and I am momentarily flummoxed. Images of running water flood my brain.

"Exactly. Ermmm"

"Would you like me to bring it up?" he offers, finally making sense. That wasn't my original plan. I don't know what my plan was, but it certainly would be me solving the issue, not him. But the pressure was on.

"Thanks" I say and hang up quickly. It was starting to hurt by now, and I really needed the bathroom. I should wait. I should wait for the guy to come up, knock and drop of the bags. Oh no, is he going to want a tip? There is no question of that. I wait for about 2 seconds before it occurs to me he may come up in ten minutes time, and by then my bladder would surely have exploded. The rules say you have to have finished arriving before peace can occur. Oh man. This is bad.

The only way forwards is to get the water side of things over with in the traditional fashion, get the luggage, then go in and sit down and make ohm noises for a while. It's breaking the rules but so be it, I am that desperate.

I run to the bathroom and bounce back painfully off the door that opens outwards for some stupid reason. I pull it open and go in, locating the toilet and unzipping my flies in one movement. I just have time to flip up the lid when the torrent comes rushing out, almost making my eyes water with release or was it tension, I don't know. But it certainly helped. I closed my eyes for a daring few seconds, going by sound alone. This was a dangerous thing to do and I only did that on good days, but the torrent coming out of me was so very liberating, the optimist in me went mad and I relax my neck and enjoyed it. Aaaaaaaah.

The knock on the room door ripped me out of my stupor. The last drips were almost done when I jolted my eyes open, splashing the back of the lid a tiny bit, but just a tiny tiny bit. I'd get that with toilet paper.

"Just a minute" I call as I swiftly pull up my zipper. But my zipper broke. It didn't register at first. There was just the slightest irregularity as the zipper travelled up the teeth, a blink in the trajectory of this great 19th century invention. It got to the top easily and I quickly bent down to pick up some paper and wipe up the back, oh and little bit on the floor to the left of the bowl where I must have missed while peeing, eyes closed, blind as a bat, and going by sonar like they do. There were really just two drops on the side of the bidet, predictably too close to the toilet. I don't know why they bother putting them in. Some class thing from the fifties.

When the claws came out at the speed of light from behind the bidet, I was utterly unprepared. My mind went "Whu?" as I saw them finish their arc and go back into the shadows. Four clawed fingers and one clawed thumb, a good inch per claw, on a matted hairy hand, seemingly coming out of the plumbing at the back of the bidet.

Obviously I shot up like a cat with fireworks. My head miraculously missed the empty shelf on the wall and I landed both feet flat on the ground, my body already  passed the flight response and considering tele-transportation. A blur of grey flew out towards me from behind the bidet just as I was spinning on one foot and lunging for the door.

The receptionist had no doubt heard me before, but somehow he can't have caught my words exactly, because he let himself in and was placing the bag on the floor by the bed as I alighted from  the bathroom corridor, composing myself in mid air as I landed halfway into the room. As my feet met the ground I froze as my trousers gently but unfalteringly descended my thighs and on to below the knees, resting around ankles, zipper pulled up on one side but not connected on the other, y-front undies on display, one tiny damp spot where my member lay spent after the deluge. The receptionist hardly looked me up and down at all, his eyes settling on mine, with a look of mild shock on his face.

The koala ran out behind me and leapt up on to the bed, choosing to take the route between my legs to get there. As the grey marsupial burst forth from between my knees and on to the bed, he too froze on landing. The receptionist gave him the exact same treatment, exactly the same. He just glanced in slight surprised and looked the animal straight in the eyes, as if the koala should question it's own existence. After a second he turned to me.

"No animals allowed in the room, sir?" And he spun around and left.

"But" but it was too late. He was gone. The koala chose that moment to leap at me again, this time going for the jugular. I ducked and banged my head on the courtesy writing desk as he sailed passed and bounced off the floor, out the small gap of the window left open to the balcony. Distant scratching noises indicated he was shimmying down the side of the building and on, off into the night to explain this one to his family in the wilderness. "And his trousers fell down" he'd say and all the little koalas would roll around the place laughing, off their tits on eucalyptus by all accounts.

I know when I am beaten and the receptionist had won, or was it the koala? Who cares? The place was a minefield, by head was spinning and a droplet of blood was making it's way own my forehead. I put on the clammy shirt regardless, pick up up my bag and ran out of the room in to the lift and down to the lobby. I had an explosive feeling of the end in sight when I saw there was nobody in reception. I put the key on the desk there and fled out the door to an awaiting taxi. Just like in the movies, straight into the back seat dragging my baggage after me. I slam the door.

"Airport".

The driver has seen the routine before, and speeds off like he knows the whole story. He only glances in his rear view mirror a couple of times. The second time I know I have to say something so I just blurt out

"Tripadvisor will hear about this" and wipe the blood from my brow on the sleeve of my shirt. that's all the explanation he needs and he drops me off for an easily made 20 dollars and I go through to get my ticket for the next flight out of there to Brisbane and Clarissa, the one person who could calm me down after these sorties. She was going to have to work overtime on this one. She says I have the wrong job, and she might be right. I get on the plane and the personnel can tell they should give me a wide birth and they generally do.

As the snack trolley goes by I ask for nuts and get the heinous package given to me with a curt smile that says "please don't tell me".

"Do you have any Southern Comfort and some lemonade?" I ask, somewhat sharply through no fault of my own. I heard myself ask the question, and couldn't believe I'd dare to, having got "the stare", and it came out somehow just a bit too crisp. The lady sat next to me turned towards us, as if attracted by the chance of commotion.

"I'm sorry sir, we don't serve alcohol" and there is just enough of a rebuke there for me to feel the whole plain load of passengers think "pisshead" and I could have cried, but I concentrated on the nuts. Those ridiculously tiny packets of nuts. I got them open on the third attempt and leaned back, avoiding looking anywhere at all but dead straight on, eating one nut every five seconds until less than a minute later the packet was empty and I had nothing to do with my hands.

I looked out the window to see if I could catch Clarissa leaving for the airport to pick me up. I couldn't see anything from this altitude but she would be there before me. In less than an hour I would be with her again and I could let go of my fears and just be ... she will hear the story and believe every word, and let me lie with my head on her lap, at peace at last, ready to go to bed and fight a new day tomorrow, when I get to tell my boss why I wasn´t selling sealant in Bundaberg today. He, I would have to convince, but I guess I would just have to play it cool.