LAUGH? I almost bought a round.

It was one of those stories where you simply cannot credit the frailties of human understanding. I’m talking about that list of complaints made by passengers on cruises that had been compiled by travel company Bonvoyage.

Fair enough, we can all grab the wrong end of the stick. Take my wife, Maria, for instance.

We were badly behind schedule while driving to the West Country down the Fosse Way and I commented: “We’ll miss the Glastonbury Tor.”

“Why?” she said. “What time does the last one start?”

And wait, there’s more.

While driving along Scarborough Promenade I said: “The Spa is just down here.”

“Funny place for a supermarket,” she replied.

These are moments of delightful scattiness. And I’m not above making mistakes myself. Even nautical ones. (I said nautical, not naughtical). Like the time I caught the wrong ferry at Dover and sailed to Ostend instead of Calais.

At least I didn’t complain about it.

Unlike the passengers who seem to have checked in their brains as “not wanted on voyage” when they complained about the cruises they had been on.

One woman who complained about the seas being too loud. Or the couple who accused a captain of being ‘rude’ for sailing off when they had specifically left a note saying they needed an extra two hours more sightseeing in port.

One lady was irate at the lack of Gary Barlow. He had been on the ship on an earlier cruise and she demanded to know why he wasn’t on her cruise. Then there was the chap who wanted compensation for not getting a tan and having to buy warm clothes on a cruise – to Alaska.

A first time tripper was upset when he got seasick. He asked for a schedule of future cruises in which this could be avoided. A woman who had booked with a company called Celebrity Cruises asked for a refund because there were no celebrities.

Then there was the couple who said the service had been so good they had tipped too much. Please could they have some money back? And just when you think people couldn’t be any dimmer, how about the lady who complained about having no view, after booking an inside cabin, and then asked for a window to be fitted?

Finally, there was the couple who were disappointed because their ship didn’t look like the Titanic.

At least it didn’t sink.