My annual trip to the NRL grand final has been and gone, with what happened on the trip more interesting than what happened on the field.

My travelling companion and room-mate over the last few years, regular readers will be happy to know, has maintained his penchant for baby powder, showering like a fireman who has lost control of his hose and sight-seeing historically significant sites, like 100-year-old trees and famous steps of Sydney.

I am still dusting baby powder off the majority of my clothes that were unlucky enough to touch any surface in the bathroom and I have made a mental note to take my own toilet paper from now on as the second user of the facilities everything was soaking wet.

But the trip down was fairly uneventful. The game, the casino and everything else was pretty standard but the trip home was a little more memorable.

It all began when we arrived at the airport, with the check-in queue nearly as long as the silvertails merchandise stands at the footy.

So we checked in at an electronic booth and scored seats 1A and 1B – bingo, we thought.

Of course, my well-powdered and rested companion boasted that he didn’t have to put a bag through as he only had carry-on, and headed with a spring in his step, I might add, off to the Krispy Kreme Donut Shop.

After I had stood in the bag drop for about 40 minutes, they made an announcement that all passengers travelling to the Sunshine Coast should break from the line and head to counters 1 and 2.

So a couple in front of me hurdled the tape and I followed. As we were directed to a counter, a lady in that line took exception to the fact that I was jumping the line and told me to get to the back, where I threw a little tantrum but succumbed to the steely look and obliged, but did point out that I was only doing what I was told and, anyway, the plane wasn’t going anywhere without us.

As I looked around for some support from my fellow travellers, hoping for the 3% of separation to kick in, I was met with stony silence.

So eventually I got through and was told to go straight to the gate and forgot all about old mate who turned up a while later, blowing up because he was minding the table at donut heaven and wasn’t game to leave it so he could purchase and subsequently inhale his bounty.

When he was abusing me, I thought I did see some icing sugar in the corners of his mouth.

So, when we got on the plane, there was a petite young lady who must have been thinking "How good is this front-row seat?" until Huey and Dewy sat down and nearly speared her into the cockpit. Not impressed.

So, to break the ice, I commented on how nice her shoes were (they looked like Dorothy’s out of the Wizard of Oz) but old mate beside me thought I was talking about his shoes and went on to tell me where he bought them from, which at least got us all laughing.

But she still didn’t speak so he asked her whether she had been to the footy. Response: blank look.

Where are you visiting, what are you doing, etc - all came up with zip. He then whispered to me: "I think she is foreign, French maybe." So he asked her. Nothing. Italian? Nothing.

Eventually she figured it out and answered: “Moscow.” "Easy mistake to make," he said.

So when it was ascertained that she didn’t hate us, well not much anyway, he relaxed.

Now lunch was being served and I had a tray in the armrest, the Ruskie had one but old mate had nothing, so I asked. Well, the hostess rushed off and came back with this contraption that had two slides on it that was supposed to go into his armrests but there was a stomach, possibly chock full of donuts, in the way.

Truly, the look on his face when he tried to fit the tray was akin to her saying: “We are about to crash, assume the position.”

After a bit of stammering and stuttering, he managed to convince her to abort.

So we were left to demolish the snack menu, sharing my postage-size tray like two giant Siamese twins, and footy was just a fading memory.