Not only my football team are ‘on the brink’ of DESTRUCTION!!!, but this morning my beloved car presented me with this message! That car to me is like a third grandchild; a second wife (possibly first!!!). I would say a third daughter but this is the first time it’s given me any trouble so it’s not an appropriate comparison. Every time I drive my car I grin like… like… ok, like some kind of simpleton, I’ll give you that, but it makes me happy. This morning I got in, smiling, took the roof down, still smiling, then pulled away and got this message. Then I looked like the ‘shocked’ emoji with an open mouth and hands on the sides of my face. But I wasn’t yellow. Amazingly. And the car handled like a 1967 Ford Anglia. Clunky gear changes. Sluggish. Awful. Because my car uses a PDK gearbox. Oh. Well, to give it the full title: Porsche Doppelkupplungsgetriebe, is just one ‘vorgsprung Dorsche technique’ too far, for my liking. And the PDK is simply the best thing ever. Until this morning when it became the worst thing ever. I’ve booked it in. This is emotionally and, I feel, financially, very distressing. My poor babe!!!! (Gushing tears emoji).

So I wondered, as it’s Lila/Joey day and they’re at school, what the best way to relax and chill might be after such a trauma. And I decided that the best thing you can ever do to find your karma, to pull the yin back from the yang, is to phone a massive company. And in fact I decided to phone two. First British Airways and then Santander. Why? Because their on-hold music, which you’re guaranteed to hear for at least 20 minutes, MINIMUM!!, is so great. About 3 hours later and I’m ready to end it all. I will never phone either again. Ever!

And that’s where we are now. Do I feel better? Have I achieved anything? Was it worth the (massive) bother? Possibly. Next Thursday I’m going to spend three hours abusing myself with a claw hammer, see if that feels any better afterwards.

Though I’ve decided I’m going to stand in the Makerfield by-election on June 18. Why not? Everyone else is. Though not necessarily because they give a shit about Makerfield or the fine inhabitants thereof. They all have ‘agendas’. Andy Burnham; we know his. The short-cut to No.10 lies in that Wigan suburb. Nigel Farage reckons by using a local plumber (again; there’s a pattern here) as his candidate he can further humiliate Kier Starmer. And Andy Burnham. And although Burnham is (horribly, catastrophically, disastrously) Northern, ironically, it’s a future in London SW1 that he craves more than Eccles cakes and flat caps and the fucking Gallagher brothers. So I figured, me… Wigan… why not? I could patronise the local people with tales of Shoreditch, with lists of restaurants, with speed cameras in your own driveways and the magic of tube trains. I would pledge allegiance to their pot-holes (everyone’s local obsession), claim Britain to be ever-Europe-free and summon their inner Zionists.

How hard would it be?

Happy Thursday

A xxxx