I have been pleased to discover a post from Oliver who appears to have gone over to the Dark Side and has been engaged in acts of wickedness.
Readers, I have a child who is so lost to civilisation and everything which is good and virtuous that he has been playing computer chess instead of doing his prep.
I am shocked. Indeed, I was moved to email him with some maternal words of admonishment. I told him sternly that if he was going to play chess instead of doing his prep then he ought to be considerably more careful not to be discovered.
Indeed, there is an ancient proverb on the subject which has become something of a family motto, and which goes: If You’re Naughty, Don’t Get Caughty. This has formed a sound basis for almost all of my parenting over the years.
Not getting caughty, that’s the important bit.
As it happens he is not the only one who has shirked on his responsibilities today.
I went back to bed.
The day started quite well. Mark went off to work, and then the Mrs. Number Two Daughters set off in search of new adventures.
They have gone now. They have packed their bags and departed, we will not see them again for ages.
I am sorry about this, they are entertaining company, and also good at cooking. They took their cooking abilities off to my parents’ house, where they seem to have cooked a medley of different varieties of pie for dinner. This sounded ace and I was sorry to have missed it. I like pie, which is partly why I have become such a well-rounded individual.
It took a while to usher them out of the door. This was mostly because they could not remember what they had done with the car keys and we had to unpack everything in the front hallway and hunt through it all until eventually we discovered them neatly wrapped up in their laundry. Once they had gone I spent about half an hour tidying up their left-behind debris and then realised that I was yawning so much that I could hardly see what I was doing.
I did not bravely work my way through it. I rang Mark and told him that I was going to slope off to bed.
He was not cross and self-righteous about this. Actually I thought he was probably rather relieved. I had not had very much sleep the night before, and I think he finds it hard to love me when I am tired and cross.
Anyway he was encouraging.
I went to bed.
I do not like going to bed without Mark. This is not so much from a romantic standpoint as because he radiates a wonderful warm glow.
Actually it is a hot glow. It is like curling up next to a dragon. The small difficulty with this is that it means close relations between us have a seasonal ebb and flow. I am very much more inclined to feeling fond of him in January than I am in August
This is because I get very cold, most especially my feet. In fact I radiate cold the way he radiates heat. Lying next to me he can feel it even though no bit of me is actually touching him. It has been one of the small happinesses of our marriage. Sharing a bed with Mark means that I have never needed to replace the electric blanket so beloved of my single years.
Goodness me, I regretted that omission this morning.
I simply could not get warm.
I shivered and dozed and woke and shivered, and in the end I had to give up.
I took the dogs out and hoovered the living room instead.
I am off to bed now.
Mark is there already.
This time it will be fine.
