It drives me flipping mad!

Oooh err! December already! That means one thing..... by the end of the month I'll be another year older, something I find immensely depressing, not to mention a little bit galling because twice now I've thought I was a year older than I was.

"So, how old will you be on your next birthday" asked a neighbour of my parent's politely a few years back (and I'm not saying how many!)

"36" I answered confidently. After all, I'm a mature, intelligent person, educated to degree level, held some fairly high powered jobs in my time. I must know my age mustn't I?

"No you're not", said my mother

"Ummmm" I replied slightly less confidently

"You were born in 19XX (see, I'm really not telling) and this year is XXXX that makes you 35 next birthday"

A quick add up and damn, damn, damn, I am in fact a whole year younger than I've been telling everyone. I feel cheated.... I've missed a year of my life. Just think what I could have done with that year? I could have found the cure for warts (I won't go so far as to say AIDS), I could have been the first British astronaut in space, I could have invented some fabulous object that would have the Dragon's Den drooling. I could have been a double agent for MI6 and been parachuted behind enemy lines in Afghanistan (except I don't think there were any then), I could have directed a Bollywood blockbuster......I could have done so many things. But the year was lost so I did the decent thing and did nothing for the next year as I bemoaned my fate, to be 36 two years running!

A few years later and 'rebelote', as they say in France. I did the same thing. So now I've lost two years of my life.

Anyway, this year we're feeling the pinch a bit as the CH's last employer has failed to pay him. A minor oversight I know but not one they seem in any hurry to sort out. It would, of course, be churlish to 'name and shame' them and I'm far too mature to do that.

Bugger it, no I'm not! I lost two years of my life, does that make me two years younger do you think? Young enough to say GRAND PICTURES IN DUBLIN, you know who you are. Stop fannying around being media types and pay your poor freelancers or I'll put a hex on youse. An old Tinker's curse, so your Orla Kiely bags will turn to potato sacks and your account card at Brown Thomas will turn into a Netto storecard, you'll become invisible when you go to Lily's Bordello and Bono will forget who you are. Be afraid........ be very afraid.

So, no power tools for me this birthday or Christmas and the poor little offspring are really looking forward to their Christmas IOUs.

Anyway, it's great to have the CH back on the same landmass as me for a prolonged period. Ask me again in a month and I might be saying different. When you spend a lot of time apart you have to get used to each other again. He needs a gentle reminder that I watch every single property programme on the TV and that CSI is de rigeur (sorry, I'm letting myself down now!). That the world will keep turning if he misses an episode of 'Deal or No Deal' (I think it's his addictive personality that's responsible for his obsession with this dreadful show - given to us by the French actually).

But most of all he needs to know that adverts aren't evil and the homestead will not be permanently polluted by consumerism if he allows one to air. He has an almost bizarre (actually, there's no almost about it!) dislike of adverts and the minute they come on, he rugby tackles the 'holder of the remote control' (even though it's most likely him) and starts manically flipping through the channels. To be doubly annoying, he flicks through all the channels we can't even get so the TV shows a montage of 'You need to subscribe to watch this channel' and 30 second clips of the different programmes that are airing while we invariably miss the first few minutes of the next part of whatever we were watching. How can this be less annoying than adverts?

Answers on a postcard please.....!

Mamma Mia!

Yesterday was DD's birthday. I can't believe that 11 years ago I was sitting in hospital wondering if they had made a dreadful mistake and stitched my navel to my knees (it certainly felt like it!)

Actually, I was probably wondering where she was. I had a difficult end to the pregnancy and she was whisked off fairly quickly to be checked over - but they forgot to bring her back! The CH arrived with the Grandparents..

Ta Da! Here's our new......... where is she?

I.... blub..... don't..... blug.... know. They .....blub....took her away....blub..... ages ago.


Right, he said. And off he headed, a man on a mission to find his newborn daughter.

He returned a short while later clutching a Polaroid.

No, no! When they took her she was round and pink, this is flat and white. It's not the same! Where's my baby?

I've always dreamed of a government initiative where they took they away at a year old and returned them at 21, potty trained, through puberty, acne and first girlfriends/boyfriends, well mannered and with a job but this was ridiculous!

Well, unfortunately she had to go into Special Care for a few days and, dreadful mother than I am, I looked on it as a bit of a bonus. No waking up for nightfeeds, I could just rest. Of course I hadn't banked on other people's babies.

They just kept waking up and wailing. I mean, how's a girl supposed to get some sleep?

"Oi, missus, can't you keep Jade Chelsea Chardonnay quiet down there?". My own baby isn't keeping me awake so I don't expect yours to!

And thus it continued up to her 11th birthday, where I continue to not quite cut the mustard on the motherhood front.

A list of my transgressions this birthday are....

1. Having been entrusted by the Grandparents with getting her birthday present I completely forgot to order it. So completely that it wasn't until her birthday that I realised.

2. Left leaving ordering her present till so late that I had to pay for an extra pigeon to try and get it here in time.

3 Failed to be in when the pigeons tried to deliver it on her birthday so we couldn't pick it up until the day after

4. Forgot where I had hidden the present from her best friend in the UK

5. Forgot to wrap her presents necessitating an 'Ohmigod' wake up at 5am so I could hurriedly stick a bit of wrapping paper round

6. And worst of all, failed to get the CH home for her birthday. It's the first one he's ever missed and she cried for an hour when I told her he couldn't be there. But honest, that wasn't my fault.

On the plus side, I did take her and some friends for an afternoon shopping, followed by Pizza and Mamma Mia at the cinema. I had no idea that Meryl Streep could speak French so well!

If you haven't seen it, go (if you are a girl. If you are a man, go down the pub instead).

What a lovely bit of escapist nonsense it was but boy do I wish I'd seen it in the UK instead. I was dying to get up and sing and dance but when I had a little singalong at the end, the young French girls in front turned and looked at me as if I'd passed wind in the middle of a Requiem Mass. We sat and watched it in that very French anally retentive way. Hands on laps and studious expressions.

The subtitles of the songs were brilliant. Half the time they bore absolutely no relation to what was being sung. But people.... Pierce Brosnan? What was that about? The man just can't sing.

I told the children that I was going to model myself on Julie Walters and wear silver flares and platform shoes and behave outrageously. They looked at me slightly nervously..... because they know, deep down, that it's quite possible!