Festooned as he was, with thirty dried moths, each carefully pinned to a particular part of his body - a part that would be least expecting to have a moth attached to it at that time of year - it occurred to J____ that from a sufficient distance, it might appear as though he had boarded the plane not through a portable staircase, as was customary, but through a leaf blower that had previously served as a confused beehive. Underneath the moths he was naked and brooding.
This was part of his punishment.
He was brooding because he was unhappy. He was unhappy about the purpose of his travelling this morning. Namely, the radiator conference. J____ had become painfully aware, like a recently sentient firelog, that this was to be his 32nd such event. You might reasonably suppose him to have a keen interest in heating appliances, but no, no. As surely as he was afeared of moths, was J____ almost violently opposed to the idea of convection based heat transfer for the purpose of warming rooms or halls. And maybe bathrooms, although he didn’t dedicate a great deal of thought to this.
‘Delicious food and drink’ he thought, as he closed his eyes, and dropped feet first from the airplane door.
fin