The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1439 by Angharad Copyright © 2011 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

“While we’re up here, anywhere you want to go?”

“What for?”

“I dunno, new outfit or bag–you know things women come to Town for.”

“In the circumstances, I don’t feel comfortable spending unnecessarily when there are people who’ve lost everything.”

“That happens every day, somewhere.”

“But I don’t see it, Simon. When I do see it, I feel it would be somewhat insensitive.”

“Okay, but I did offer.”

“Yes, and I’m very grateful for it.”

“How about we go and find somewhere nice for lunch?”

I wasn’t too sure about that either, but then I wasn’t in training as an ascetic and I knew he’d be hungry–he always is. “Is there somewhere close by?”

“Not quite, ah good, the cab’s still waiting.” We walked back to it and Simon gave instructions to the driver who drove off down roads I’d never seen before. To be honest, I don’t know London that well. Okay, I can get lost in Oxford Street or Trafalgar Square–I did when I went to watch the Tour de France prologue which went round Hyde Park.

We ended up somewhere in the West End, Soho I think, and he paid off the cabby before escorting me down some steps into an Italian restaurant. Given that I usually only snack at lunch, I suspected that I was going to be tempted to eat too much so I’d be sleepy all afternoon. I decided I’d set my boundary and stick to it, Simon could do what he wanted–he would anyway.

He ordered a full meal for himself, I settled for a bowl of minestrone soup and some ciabatta. I drank water; he downed a half carafe of Chianti along with his pasta. Neither of us ordered a sweet, although we did have coffee, mine a latte; his a cappuccino. He got the bill and we took another cab to the station and home. I read the Guardian I’d lugged round with me all the way home, Simon fell asleep and snored. As we were in first class–I usually travel standard–passengers gave me evil looks because I couldn’t shut him up. If they think that was bad, they should try sharing a bed with him when he goes into reverse thrust...

I was relieved when we got back to Portsmouth, although I had a little difficulty in rousing him. However, I did achieve it and we walked–or I walked he staggered back to the car park. “You can drive,” he yawned and passed me the keys. Wow, I get to play with his precious Jaguar.

It wasn’t much of a play, we were home in about twelve minutes just as the clock in the hall was striking half past three. Simon sloped off to the sitting room and zonked on the sofa, while I was left to tell the children all about what we’d seen. I was rather glad I’d taken the photographs, they helped save me lots of difficult descriptions.

Meems in particular, had little concept of a building gutted by fire–where you can look up through charred timbers and masonry to the sky above. I took a couple of photos like that–three storeys of destruction–what a mess and what a smell.

They couldn’t understand that there's quite a bit of soot about the place and that it was still wet from the fire hoses and various foams and things they use to douse the flames. All I could try to say was that the heat was enough to set fire to some of the bricks–which is pretty damn hot.

We then had a discussion on this–none of them believed me. I tried to explain what they were seeing on the computer, that the changes in the colour of the bricks was due to them combusting, but they couldn’t get their heads round that. Wood burns, stone doesn’t.

Then I had a brainwave–I went onto the internet and showed them a volcano–that’s molten rock–which is often on fire–that spews from the business end of it. If it gets hot enough, rock and ergo, brick will burn. I’d forgotten how challenging teaching could be.

Trish of course then went into overdrive talking about all different sorts of volcano. Danny rolled his eyes and sloped off while the girls sat there and listened politely to their sister while being just the tiniest bit bored–okay, bored rigid. I did manage to shut her up by an offer of ice cream, which caused a stampede into the kitchen.

I called up to Danny who couldn’t hear me because he was blasting music–Fleetwood Mac–my CD–and he was damaging his ears to The Chain which they use for the Formula 1 racing on BBC, which he also likes. Strange creatures men and boys, watching noisy machines whizzing round in circles at two hundred miles an hour and saying they enjoy it. I’d rather watch cycling any day or even cricket.

I put some large potatoes to cook in the slow oven as jacket spuds–Meems saw me and licked her lips–“I wuv jacket ’tatoes,” she said then went off to play with her pram.

Tom told me that he’d enjoyed having a group of locusts destroying his strawberry beds. He’d managed to collect just enough for dessert, the rest had been eaten as soon as they were picked and even those he managed to save had been endangered until he’d brought them indoors and shut them in the fridge. I was half gearing myself up for tummy aches and diarrhoea–but thankfully none of that happened.

I made up a tuna in mayonnaise with chopped onion and herbs to go in the potatoes and prepared some salad to go with it. The strawberries I used for a cheesecake, which while not my favourite, was enjoyed by the others. I’d have preferred a flan except I didn’t have a spare flan case and was too lazy to make one.

Simon did wake up after I sent the girls to get him, and he sat and yawned his way through dinner, grumbling about the rabbit food which Tom had started, opining that he, ‘wisnae a dormoose an’ whit wis ’rang wi’ chicken curry?’

I told both the men that they weren’t rabbits or dormice because those creatures didn’t carry the same amount of body fat as the men did, even prior to hibernation. I’d been trying to keep Tom’s weight down a little especially after he had that heart attack earlier on, and Simon was just eating too much and exercising too little.

I suppose in all fairness, neither would say anything to me if I were to accumulate an excess of adipose tissue until they wanted to parade me in front of others–then they’d say something. I was actually in reasonable shape through watching what I ate–it certainly wasn’t through cycling or other exercise–although I did do quite a bit of running about after the children, especially in the holidays.

Tom had borrowed the first of the Harry Potter films from the library, so they all went into the sitting room to watch it with him–except he’d be asleep before the second reel. I checked up on them after I’d cleared up and he was fast asleep which made the children giggle and temporarily woke him.