Home comforts

I am a Bad Mother. And a Bad Wife. I've been both those things at various intervals over the years, but not generally at the same time. In fact I usually find I can either be a very good wife, at the expense of the children, or a very good mother, at the expense of my husband. Being good at both things at once is frankly far too much effort, especially when factoring in a full-time job, so I mostly settle for mediocrity across the board.

This week I am a bad mother because I am away from home for an entire week. That in itself doesn't make me a bad mother; what makes me a bad mother is the fact that I'm enjoying it. I'm not pining for the children, I'm not missing my husband, I'm not homesick for my bed or desperate for home-comforts. I'm revelling in the ability to go running after work instead of tackling tea-time, to wallow in a scalding bath, and to work uninterrupted in the evenings without feeling guilty that I'm neglecting anyone.

Anniversary Sex

It was our wedding anniversary last week, and my husband suggested we have sex.


"Why?" I said.


"Well, you know. Recreate our wedding night"


I distinctly recall on the night of our wedding both being so rat-arsed we could scarcely put the key in the lock, let alone a rampant member in the correct orifice, but I wisely kept quiet and submitted to Anniversary Sex.

Motorway tail-backs and the surprising capacity of a nappy

We're an hour into the stationary tail-back. The M40 snakes back through South Oxfordshire; an inert mass of cars filled with would-be shoppers. You know it's bad when people start getting out of their cars, sitting on the hard shoulder with make-shift picnics and swapping numbers with the family in the Touran next to them. We haven't done badly so far; forty-seven rounds of 'three little monkeys jumping on the bed', a box of raisins each and a bottle of water which has been rolling around the footwell for the last six months. I knew I'd left it there for a reason. The children are in surprisingly good spirits considering lunch is due any moment and we should by now have been at John Lewis enjoying an egg sandwich each.