Marmite

Hubby came home on Sunday after a fortnight cycling in Germany and Austria. He kept teasing me that most of the 21 other participants were women. I didn’t mind at all – the photos showed how dreadful they looked in Lycra. Apart from one, whom he photographed while riding behind her. This probably explained the expense of the souvenir gift he bought me.

With apologies to Daphne du Maurier. Also, apologies if my controversial satirical blog sounds more like Bridget Jones’s Diary these days. I mean, really, really sorry. I went off BJD when I read somewhere that Colin Firth’s character was based on TTK when he was Director of Public Prosecutions before he came out as Big Brother’s evil twin and Lord Alli’s favourite. That and Hugh Grant remoaning all the time. Enough to put you off your Weetabix. TTK is so loathsome that I’m finding political commentary increasingly nauseating. I need a break. Having said I was beginning to sound like BJD, what follows is not exactly a diary of problematic romances but a romanticised diary of problems. 

I loved Friends , the American TV comedy series about, well, friends. Each show had a memorable moment, like the one about Rachel losing her engagement ring, and the one about Chandler flirting in a bank’s ATM foyer. Inevitably, the phrase ‘the one about’ became synonymous with the show. Part of its charm was its relatability; the protagonists were always falling out with each other or having a larff at each other’s expense or hugging or crying or being plain stupid.

Whether I’m clad in jeans, over-sized shirt and no makeup while slugging wine at my neighbour’s kitchen table, or dressed to the nines to hob-nob among the elite, as Thénardier sang in Les Miz, I am queen of my own society. But the fact that I’m blogging about it is a sure sign that things recently went horribly wrong.

Do you remember when we were kids and we’d spend hours catching snowflakes (not the sissy-kind) on our tongues, surrounding parked cars with white snowmen (not a non-white snowperson in sight), making the playground treacherous with ice-slides, throwing snowballs at our friends and cramming snow down the necks of bullies who were targeting the littl’uns?

It’s Sunday morning. I’m halfway down my second gut-scraping Americano, and I’ve caught up on my current affairs reading. Time to blog, but what about? I’m kinda current-affaired out. So, how about our trip to Henley Royal Regatta this week. A happy, uplifting, dreadfully inconsequential tale, but it makes me smile as I write. Actually this year we went twice. Wednesday we met with Hubby’s family and caught up with tales of aunts and uncles, cousins and co. The racing was a bit ho hum. Too many walkovers. But despite this, plus the traffic and the rain and the cold and the extortionate prices, a stonking good time was had by all. 

I went to see a friend today, probably for the last time. I wasn’t the only one. Three more people arrived as I was leaving. “They’re all coming to say goodbye, you see,” explained his remarkable and remarkably calm wife. So had I.

With apologies to Robert Burns. It seemed like a simple-enough plan: drive to a South Yorkshire Premier Inn on Wednesday afternoon, drive Sis early Thursday morning to hospital for a major procedure and week-long stay, drive back to her flat, do some cleaning, tidying and pack some things for her eight-week convalescence with us, post a letter through all her neighbours’ doors saying someone had better take over the management company or Project Fear would kick in. Yes I realise that the majority of Northerners didn’t fall for the Remoaner Project Fear claptrap, but I know what buttons to press in the North. While waiting for my phone to jump out of my back pocket with multiple volunteers (ever the optimist), I’d find all the relevant paperwork in Sis’s flat in readiness for the handover. What could possibly go wrong?

That cry went up all over London when my old Cambridge college arranged an alumni evening in an Islington pub last week, and I registered to attend. Without Hubby. Out came the curling tongs, on went the mascara and off I went to catch the train. I was really looking forward to it, despite the attendance list containing the names of only three people I knew: a rejoiner, a communist and a Greek scholar (plus fellows and administrators). Still, I was confident that others who hadn't registered would turn up. That always happens at these drinky things and, my college being my college, starting a conversation with complete strangers is de rigueur. The pub wasn't on a convenient bus or underground route and it wasn't far enough to justify a taxi, so I walked from the flat. Halfway there, the clouds burst. My umbrella that normally won't close, at that moment wouldn't open. Oh, my hair! I found the pub and dashed to the ladies to scrunch and spritz and reapply the lip glo...

We went up to London but not to visit the Queen. Sob sob. (Third blog in five days? Something must be rotten in the state of R-land …) Four of us congregated in our flat at odd times during the afternoon because we were all coming from different directions. I was first to arrive at about 3:45pm. I had intended to be there earlier but I had a brain fart at Euston Station and, instead of walking to Euston Square to get the Tube to Farringdon, I dreamily drifted down the escalators to the Northern Line and nearly ended up at London Bridge.