It was a bit of a cock-up on the parenting front last weekend as Kirsty asked me really late in the day if I could have the children. One, the gorgeous Melanie was coming up. Two, I was quite ill. But I'm going to be away for ten days shortly so I couldn't say no really.
On Thursday I was shivering in a duvet and went a bit doolally, taking rubbish and forgetting people's names (this is on absolutely no drink at all, before you start wondering). Friday morning I dragged myself onto the 0722 to Leeds for a supervision meeting. In Leeds I kept looking at the TV trying hard to remember why it is that everyone has poppies on at this time of year.
Melanie arrived that evening and we went down the Sun which felt like being immersed in a head-filling din of white noise. I was exhausted and had to sleep on the too-small sofa as there wasn't any more room. I didn't have any more blankets so had to make do with my coat and a couple of jumpers. When she came down in the morning I went to introduce her to my housemates and I had completely forgotten her name. "That looks great doesn't it," she joked. "We have actually met before last night."
Melanie was a star on Saturday. Seeing me struggling to stay awake, she said she could take the girls out for a couple of hours so that I could get a bit of sleep. I was so grateful to her. In the evening she put them to bed as I had to go out and compere at the Yorkshire House for Lancaster Musicians Co-operative's 25th anniversary gig. I'd arranged for someone else to look after them later on so she came down to the gig and finally started having a bit of a weekend.
Melanie went back and Felicity came round for a bit of a roll in the hay. It didn't really work for me because I was aware of the others in the house. She's noisy, shouting down the stairs to me as I brought the drinks up, as if wanting to make sure Bela, Csilla and Stefan knew she was here. She further irritated my tired, humourless self by taking the foam inserts out of my expensive Sennheiser headphones and putting them on her nipples.
Yesterday I rang Frances, who I haven't seen for a while. We had another of her lovely meals (chestnut roast, roast potatoes and roast veg, onion gravy). She looked stylish and pretty, in a bluey-green shirt top with little folded up sleeves and a wide vertical layer of fabric overlaying the buttons, and a necklace of different coloured stones. Afterwards we sat on the sofa a couple of feet apart. "It's surprising how coy we're being with each other, isn't it?" she said. "Let's stop being coy then," I replied, and we started kissing and stroking each other, her lovely slim body and breasts against me.
I can't remember exactly what she then said: it was something along the lines of "We never did resolve why it went all wrong last time". Oh no. Not now, please! I tried to laugh it off but it all crumbled away in seconds, her accusing me of "clamming up" and "not wanting to deal with things." I stood up, straightened myself out and got ready to leave. I'm not interested in rehearsing the same pointless inconclusive conversations we had six months ago.
This morning I sent her an email saying that I just want things to be straightforward and easy, without big conversations. I said that it only seems to go wrong when things get frisky, so I suggested we just cut that side of things out and enjoy the bits that are less fraught.
