Life with Humphrey is going fairly smoothly, with the exception of having to explain my geographical origins to him twenty times an hour and having to lie to him about his mother’s whereabouts. Humphrey is a fixated on his dear old ma and cannot compute that she passed from this dimension in 1978. Thus the family has taken to bending the truth a little by saying that she is in Marlon - she is technically buried in Marlon. If pressed for more details we say she is staying with friends and will be there overnight. This ploy normally reaches a point of disbelief on Humphrey’s behalf at which stage his exasperated son-in-law (Mr Wolf, who shares the house with us) does a little maths lesson:
Wolf: [To Humphrey] How old are you?
Humphrey: 23.
Wolf: You’re sure you’re 23?
Humphrey: No, I was born in ’23.
Wolf: So how old does that make you?
Humphrey: 85.
Wolf: Well, close enough 88, but lets go with 85. Now then how old is your mother?
Humphrey: 90?
Wolf: So if you’re 85 and your mother is 90, then she was 5 years old when she had you?
At this point Humphrey generally bursts into incredulous laughter and goes off humming, like a small child sticking his fingers in his ears to block out the truth. He will be unusually quiet about his mother for at least an hour after his maths tutorial while some rational part of his brain stirs and acknowledges logic. To amuse himself during this lucid hour he will re-read the same page in the Daily Mail for a full 60 minutes.
Unlike Humphrey I cannot re-read the same article all day long and so work my way progressively through the Daily Mail and I am not well pleased with what I’ve learnt. Today for example I discovered that sugar causes wrinkles! Of course I'd heard these nasty rumours before, but now I was faced with documentary evidence. In said morale-destroying article an intrepid journalist used one of them predictive-aging-computer-program-thingies to illustrate how she would look in 10 years on: A) A High Booze Diet B) A High Sugar Diet or C) A High Fag Diet. The results where not pretty. Option A) ended with jowls, spider veined cheeks and blood shot eyes. B) Resulted in puffy-puffy chipmunk cheeks, more chins than a Chinese phone book, wrinkly eyes and more eye baggage than is allowed on a transatlantic flight. To be honest option C) was looking the sweetest, with yellowed teeth, crow's feet, spider- linage round a puckered dog's bottom mouth and noticeably mode-thin cheeks. Thanks to the Daily Rag I now have an additional worry about the devastating effect of my affair with chocolate, whereas before I was only concerned with its effect on my dimpled derriere I now know that it can affect my other cheeks too.
Having now acquired the Fear about the effect of sugar on my youth, I foolishly went shopping. Popping into H&M I discovered a delightful pair of brown plether, cotton panelled legging – the likes of which I had recently spotted in black leather on Bond girl and British actress Gemma Arterton when I celeb-spotted her at Marylebone Station last week. See exhibit A below:
Inspired by my brush with celebrity I tried the cheaper imitation leather leggings on. I should have stopped the madness when I had difficulty getting them over my ankles, but I persevered. I wrestled those bad boys over my sugary thighs and turned to marvel at myself in the mirror. ‘Ooh, get in!’ [Cue vigorous fist pumping]. For a fleeting moment I caught sight of an off-duty movie star resplendent in leather. But as my vision cleared and I cavorted to the right to study my bottom at a 45-degree angle I heard the unmistakable pop of a seam giving way. Frozen in fear of more seam-poppage I had ample time to study the incredible camel-toe awarded by rock-star leather tailoring. Attempting to extricate myself from the cookie-cutters took a further 10 minutes of pulling, grunting, sweating, swearing and light seam-poppage. I seemed to have developed cankles, as the plether was remarkably unforgiving around the ankle region. After more expletives and heavy breathing I emerged red-faced from the change-room and flung the leatherette leggings at a rather bemused looking sales assistant.
Clearly rock-star tailoring is not the answer to retaining my rapidly sucrose-faded youth…if it wasn’t for those flimsy sweatshop seams…
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