Big beak

To Manchester with middle daughter. She's got an interview with a theatrical agent. "Look Jenny, as we don't know how long this is going to last, I'm not sitting in their reception -- I'll go and have a pint then you text me when you've finished." "Yes, I'm sure you'll sniff out a pub. Your conk's big enough."

Back in Lancaster, down the pub, I am sharing a toilet cubicle with my Loveable But Uncool Friend. "Right," I said, softly. "Make sure you wash your hands and try not to go sniffing your head off as you go downstairs." "OK THEN! RIGHT YEAH NO PROBLEM!"

He went out, and at least obeyed the first part of the injunction. A few seconds later, after I had tidied everything away, an unhinged and aggressive regular barged into the cubicle. I thought he was desperate for a poo. "It's OK, you can use it now," I said.

Back at my table, our resident lunatic came over. "Give me a line of that or I'm ringing the police." "Pardon?" "I want a line of that beak. You two were snorting it upstairs." "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about." "Ok then, I'll ask the police to sort it out."

He went back to his table and made a show of pretending to ring the police. We resolutely ignored him, although my doubt that he was dissembling was sufficient to make me feel nervous. He then went up to the bar, spoke to a barman and pointed to me. The barman's insouciant nod reassured me. He went back to his table and nothing happened.

Yesterday, as I walked in, he greeted me with a "y'right?" You don't remember it do you?

Me and Wendy got through a couple of bottles of wine on Friday, then last night we met up round at hers with Kitty and another friend. Wendy spilt a load of stardust over the dog so we were considering sniffing it off the dog's back.

She told us all about last Monday morning. Getting into bed after waving me off at 4.30am, she set her alarm for 7am, to get her daughter up and off to school. To her shock, she woke up at 9am to see her estranged husband looming over her. "Wendy! It's 9 o'clock. [Our daughter] is going to be late for school. And what's been going on? There's three empty bottles of wine downstairs. Who's been round?" "That's none of his fucking business!" we all chimed.

Her daughter, seeing her parents rowing again, started crying, but was soon becalmed by the sight of Wendy's vibrator on the bedside table. "What's that blue thing?" she asked. Wendy swiftly moved the blue thing under her pillow, before soon-to-be-ex-husband noticed it. "What's that blue thing?" daughter continued to ask, while hubby self-righteously started gathering a few things she would need for school. "It's a pen, a big pen," Wendy said.

"He's got absolutely no right to march into this house -- my house, not our house, and if it had been up to me I could have rung up school with some excuse and we could have had a duvet day. What a dick. The sooner he goes to Japan the better."

It was a funny story, with more detail than I've given here, but in the midst of the general laughter, all I could think about was why Wendy had been using her vibrator after seeing me. Vainly -- in both senses -- I was hoping that it might have been connected with our evening together.