Thursday has been renamed. Its now ‘Liladay’. Because that is the day designated for Mel & I to be left in sole charge of our granddaughter. All day. With no ‘help’. Holy shshsh-

So on every other day when I post a photo of ‘my’ baby, its just because I want to. It has no relevance to Donald Trump’s nuclear aspirations, Chelsea’s laughable form or the trans-gender vegan movement’s plans to ban animals altogether, other than hermaphrodites. But on Thursdays that photo becomes highly symbolic and representative of life, as we know it.

Last night I was suffering from a particularly ‘first world’ form of sleep deprivation. Its called Avios Insomnia and is the result of trying to perform the almost impossible task of booking a flight home from Australia next year. And I mean, 2019, as in, errr, next year. Because BA opens flights up 354 days before they take off. At midnight, GMT. But the London office is closed at that time. You can’t just grab seats online because they need to be hooked up with the outward ones, booked weeks ago, and for that you need to phone. So you phone ‘New York’. Which, once you get through, you realise, is actually in New Delhi. But they call it ‘New York’ to avoid confusion. And to avoid paying New York rents and wages. In fact the staff there are lovely and very helpful. As they need to be, cos one thing the process isn’t, is easy. But that feeling of elation when you actually manage to get almost exactly what you want (always ‘almost’, never perfection but heh, life’s a compromise) is like scoring the winning goal in a cup final. The level of achievement makes you feel like Uma Thurman at the end of Kill Bill 2. Its like you wake up and realise that Donald Trump was just a (very) bad dream.

Then you can’t sleep. Because you’re so excited. Even though its now 1.30 in the morning and Lila duty starts, according to Natalie’s no-nonsense, no haggling, no prisoners time-table, at precisely 7.30. That’s a.m. In the morning. Early in the morning.

Lila is now asleep. Her scheduled ‘nap’ in the afternoon. Honest, Nat, at precisely 2.22 she went down. Because she is the perfect baby. She eats everything you give her. In that ‘1 for me, 1 for the floor’ way of babies. She doesn’t moan, she rarely cries, she’s just happy and placid, wonderfully responsive and, quite honestly, even if she wasn’t my granddaughter, I would have to say she’s the best baby in the world. Ever. Ok, mealtimes get a bit ‘post-apocalyptic’ in the kitchen, so I’ve been lecturing her on ’cause’, ‘effect’ and ‘gravity’. Never too young to learn basic physics.

And its 3 in the afternoon and I’m exhausted. Time for my nap.

Happy Liladay

A xxxx