…and God laughs. Ain’t that what they say? So this morning I planned tennis. As I do every Sunday. And woke up to pouring rain and gale force winds. But did I panic? No. I remained calm and had my pre-tennis bath. To soothe the aches and pains before the next physical onslaught my ageing body is subjected to. And I lay there listening to the 50mph winds (guessing) howling through the window frames, hearing the rain slamming against the house, ever confidant that everything would be fine. Why? Because the BBC weather app had told me it would be. And I’m such a schmuck that I believe it. They forecast rain, but ONLY til 9, maybe 9.30. And I play at 10. So just chill, dude, it’ll be fine.

At 9.30 it stopped raining. 10 minutes later the sun came out and 10 minutes after that I walked to tennis. Ok, maybe ‘walked’ doesn’t go far enough to represent the amazing Marcel Marceau type struggle against the wind which was intent on blowing me to Highgate. We played. It was… ‘interesting’. But I didn’t lose any balls. Amazingly. Just spent a lot of time retrieving them from other courts. After an hour we packed up. And as we left the park it started raining. Really raining.

I feel blessed. People were giving me odd looks on the way home. Then I saw my reflection in a shop window and saw the above. I look like Darth Vader, when they took his mask off just before he died. But the force is strong.

We had friends over for dinner last night. Which is why me and all the other international women of mystery (Mel) spent half the day in the kitchen preparing. And because we have a zero tolerance to discrimination at home, the guests included a staunch Liverpool fan (she’s from that sad City so we forgive her, and she’s a ‘she’!!!) and a season ticket holding Manchester United fan. Who is that rarest of examples in that he is actually from Manchester. Even though he now lives just round the corner. And after 40 years down here, he still sounds way more Coronation Street than Received Pronunciation.

Did I want to be talking football with these 2? On ‘black Saturday’? If I was a nicer person I wouldn’t mind. But I’m not. I’m that horrible git who is only too happy to gloat at their teams’ misfortunes and mayhaps. So I just banned football talk completely. ITS MY FUCKING HOUSE I MAKE THE FUCKING RULES!!!! We just spent a rather productive 10 minutes annihilating Manchester City, who we can all hate equally, on grounds of morality, money-laundering and fraud.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx