Dulwich Divorcee

While the rest of the country battles with its own (infinitely more serious) water woes, I have my own little fountain of troubles here at Blended Towers. The £4,600 water bill, taken out of my account by Thames Water without so much as a whisper of warning, was the first intimation that something was Not […]

Strange news from France, where married women will now be addressed in official correspondence by their maiden names.  The idea is to correct gender inequality. I’m sorry, but referring to a woman by her father’s surname instead of by her husband’s is not going to shake the foundations of the patriarchy, is it? Their intentions […]

To take my mind off the money whooshing out of my account, and the water eddying round the foundations of our house, we had a bit of a cultural weekend. First up was my Christmas treat – Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake. Now I knew this was special because the dainty, floaty swans are all played […]

Bit of a shock with my first bank statement after Christmas. Not one of those, ‘oh dear, I overdid it buying Uncle Monty cashmere socks’ moments. More an ‘OMG, WTF and many other acronyms, where has my money gone???” Well, it had all gone to Thames Water, who had removed more than £4,600 from my […]

Jolly though it is to see a politician in a tangle – and jollier still if it’s a French politician – I think our interest in Francois Hollande’s comings and goings is more than curtain-tweaking prurience.  In fact, I think it’s actually justified. The view when one of our own politicians is caught out being […]

So, you want to know what my Christmas was like? Remember that film, where Jeff Goldblum, as a mad scientist, inadvertently crosses himself with a fly? In the end, he is half fly, half human and begging his wife to put him out of his misery. Well, imagine me like that – except I am […]

I can’t quite believe that Christmas jumpers are in this year, despite the fact that both Child One and Child Two want one (they NEVER want the same thing usually) and despite seeing them in every shop window/magazine feature/and actually even on real live ‘normal’ people walking around town. Aren’t Christmas jumpers the last word […]

Amid all the doom, gloom and horribleness – oops, I mean festive cheer – I did see something that really cheered me up last weekend. We’d been to the theatre (and more of that in a post coming soon) and had run to catch the train home. We bundled on, followed by a crowd of […]

Post sponsored by Mattel I don’t know whether it’s intentional, but all TL’s suggestions for presents I could get him are things I really don’t want to buy him. Like a record turntable. These, as you know, ladies, are enormous great wodges of ugly plastic which collect dust when not belting out horrible, scratched old […]

Off we went last night to a preview of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s latest show, Stephen Ward: The Musical. When I told people, they pretty much all said, ‘what an odd idea for a musical!’ and I suppose I was hoping that it would all make sense when we were there. To be honest, I’m not […]