Lead in your pencil

On Trina's narrowboat, from which the romance is ebbing as the days get colder, it is freezing; the spiders are hibernating. Our effluvia needs emptying, before our cup runneth over. The fuel tank needs filling with diesel, and we need a new gas bottle. At the garage, someone comes out to help us, unexpectedly. Such "help" sets off a series of difficulties which at this point are unforeseen.

I lug the can of diesel along the towpath to the boat. Trina holds the sawn-off pop bottle that we use as a funnel as I start pouring the fuel in. After a few seconds Trina realises that it's petrol, not diesel, and tells me to stop. I have no idea what either petrol or diesel look like and would have blithely tipped the whole thirty litres in.

Trina rang the boat repair man. I'm glad he can drain the tank without us being there, because in his presence I feel a bit ashamed, lacking Obvious Manly Knowledge.

We attempt to pour the petrol into the car, but it flows all over our hands and onto the road because there's a valve down the hole which remains closed. Whereas other men might produce a screwdriver or a Swiss Army knife to deal with such an emergency, I had something else, equally effective, tucked in my jacket pocket.

My tool of manly manliness

We poke my Rimmel Special Eyes Kohl eyeliner down the petrol hole and hold it there for our second attempt. The fuel gurgles into the tank, and I wipe my trusty eyeliner pencil down and tuck it back into my jacket, ready for any future valve-based action. I lug the new gas bottle back, fit it without blasting half of Garstang into Yorkshire, and put a gas ring on to defrost the place.

She builds up an ineffective fire as I cut the cherry tomatoes and arrange the salami, rocket salad and sourdough bread, wishing it was pie and chips instead, and open the Rioja. My hands are cold, I am cold, and I put on another jumper. She's still sexy though, even if she smells a bit of unleaded petrol. We kiss and kiss and I suggest we go to bed. Not to get warm, because I know the bed will be clammy, cold and damp, but because she's stroking my cock through the thick woolen old ladies' Scottish blanket that I've put over my lap, as I push it up to meet her hand, over and over again. "That's just what I was going to say," she says.

The following day we drive to Southport. I'm parked in a pub while she goes to catch up with a friend, then we're staying in a hotel overnight. The silly constumes of the staff--black tie embossed with the company logo, waistcoat and dark trousers--made them look like characters in a public information film about hygiene from the 1960s. The craic in the pub was excellent, with a political discussion that got just to the right temperature without boiling over. The locals are gently pisstaking towards lager drinkers. Someone comes in, looks at the ales, then orders a San Miguel. The ale drinkers all spontaneously rise in a chorus of mock-disapproval ooohing.

Back in the hotel, she's in the bath, looking gleaming and voluptuously strokable. At night she prowls around on the creaky floors, adjusting the window, cursing a drunk in the street below us. I know she's having a bad night because she only spends an hour or so broadcasting warnings for shipping in Lundy, Irish Sea, Malin.

In the cafe in the garden centre, a bezimmered, Daily Mail-reading clientele gently fork through scones. I am drifting as she tells me stories about her son's childhood, my attention depleted, as I am depleted of sleep. Sleeping together is the one thing we can't do. Otherwise, it's uncomplicated, unreflective, straightforwardly enjoyable. Lots of sex and drink and endless nattering. On Saturday week another essential brick will be added: dancing--assuming the bailiff doesn't show any interest in my going out shoes.