Dick Gets Nicked

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Two blogs about our nutty neighbours in a month? It seems a little excessive. But when the story’s this good, I just have to share.

For those of you not in the loop, Susan and Dick, aka SuDick, are a pair of curtain-twitching, moaning retirees, who keep tabs on the movements of all other residents in our apartment block in the most busybody way imaginable.

Last month, a pair of new residents moved in and had a rather raucous party, which disturbed many other neighbours into the early hours. Inevitably, SuDick sprung into action the following morning; emails were flying around from as early as 8am to gather support for their nuisance tenants campaign.

Belligerent Bill (another curmudgeonly retiree of Post-It Note Parking fame) also waded in on the action – complaining direct to the council’s noise nuisance squad.

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Dick followed up the complaints with a strongly-worded letter, which he half-slipped under their door the following evening. Before the party-loving tenants arrived home, I managed to sneak a peak at the note itself (who’s the nosy neighbour now? I hear you cry).

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Here’s a snippet:

‘I think you’d do well to start apologising to your neighbours and show more consideration in the future…’

‘I’m telling you this in your own interests… Don’t get off on the wrong foot.’

It was a little heavy-handed perhaps but nothing too serious.

That’s not what the new neighbours thought.

At approximately 4pm on Monday, a police car pulled up outside the apartment block and two police officers got out, handcuffs jangling at their hips. Entering the premises, they headed straight for SuDick’s apartment, where they invited themselves in ‘for a chat’.

A complaint of harassment had been filed against poor Dick. The new tenants, it seemed, had decided to go nuclear on him, complaining that he was intimidating them.

Sparrow-hawk Susan sent out an email to us all, recounting Dick’s police encounter. ‘Dick wouldn’t hurt a fly,’ she cried.

She added: ‘Dick’s note was not threatening; it was just convenient to construe it in that way. He simply pointed out that such behaviour had not set them off on the right foot here and suggested an apology to those kept awake might be appreciated. None has come, of course.’

Under no circumstances are we to contact the new tenants directly about noise again. I’ve got to hand it to them.

But I do feel a bit sorry for deflated Dick, now the long arm of the law has put a stop to his over-zealous neighbourhood watch.

Susan ended her email saying that the police seemed to know a lot of information about them.

‘Are our emails being hacked?’ she pondered.

Complaints, conspiracy theories and late-night confrontations… I fear it’s only a matter of time before Dick gets an ASBO – and Susan ends up in the slammer.

The Husband… and The Puff

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What is this object?

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Yep, it’s one of those white fluffy things that you use to lather shower gel around your body.

The problem is that no one really knows what to call it. To the husband it is quite simply a ‘shower puff’. I’ve always called it a puff too. But I’m not sure what its official title is. I’ve heard it labelled a variety of things: shower scrunchie, body polisher, even a shower flower.

I once saw a besuited man in Boots attempting to explain to the shop assistant what he was looking for.

‘It’s a white fluffy shower… thing,’ he was saying, whilst doing a circular scrubbing motion with his hands.

‘A puff?’ I helpfully chipped in.

‘That’s it!’ he cried.

Anyone who doesn’t use a shower puff for everyday cleansing really is missing a trick. I mean how else do you get up the kind of lather that a puff can provide?

We have a variety of puffs in our house, including a large pink puff, which I acquired from Soap and Glory. It’s huge, and bills itself as the ‘best latherer in town’. I even bought my mother-in-law one for Christmas (turns out she loves puffs too!).

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For day-to-day showering, we plump for a simple white Boots puff (one each, of course – I’m not sure on the etiquette of a shared puff). Boots provide the best puffs; those puffs purchased from Superdrug et al. have proved feeble, and begin to unravel when faced with a vigorous scour.

The husband went on a business trip to Latvia the other week (where he got trapped in the a toilet cubicle on his way to a business meeting and had to wait half an hour for the hotel maintenance team to remove the hinges off the door. During this lavatory-based debacle, the meek Saudi man, who the husband was supposed to be meeting, was waiting on the other side of the door to greet him, arms outstretched… But that’s another story).

Being the loving wife that I am, I often leave the husband a range of silly notes when he goes away – sometimes in a pocket; sometimes in a shoe. More often than not, he doesn’t even notice them. I once popped one in his packed lunch and he accidentally ate it.

For the Latvian trip, I popped a note in with his ‘travel puff’ (travel puff lives in a clear white plastic zip up bag; he’s a slightly smaller version of your standard puff).

The note simply said, ‘Puff Daddy’. (Yep, you can see how much fun we have in our house!)

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Upon arrival, the husband – being the most unobservant man on this planet – removed trusty travel puff from his suitcase and was happily scrubbing away in the shower, whilst unbeknown to him my ‘Puff Daddy’ note had somehow ended up lying on the floor of the shower cubicle unnoticed.

This would have been fine, had the husband not been sharing a room with his work colleague.

Said work colleague then entered the bathroom – and staring back at him on the floor was a bright orange Post-It note that simply said ‘Puff’ (the ‘Daddy’ part being unfortunately folded underneath).

The husband isn’t sure whether or not he actually spotted the offending note.

But I like to imagine the work colleague spending his shower in complete and utter confusion, possibly muttering, ‘PUFF??’ to himself several times, as he lathered away.

The Return of the Nosy Neighbours

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Regular readers (ie. my sister) might be wondering what ever became of our bothersome neighbours Susan and Dick, aka SuDick.

I am pleased to report that SuDick are very much still a feature in our lives. Hardly a day goes by when I don’t have an email of some kind from them cluttering my inbox. I estimate that 90 per cent of Susan’s life is dedicated to keeping tabs on the movements of all residents, while trying to evict the management company of our apartment block – as yet, to no avail.

She even sent out an email the other week stating: ‘Just seen Isaac from Apt. 14 take delivery of a Dominos pizza at 11.30am’.

I promise I am not making this up.

In fact, no-one can leave the compound without ever-watchful Susan peering at them from her perma-perch in the window. I emailed her recently, simply to ask what the new code for the electric gates was. And this is what she replied:

Hallo Katy,

The vehicle gate is 2958. The pedestrian gate has been failing to open using the code and remote for about 10 days now – not consistently, but intermittently, enough to cause problems to a number of residents (incl Isaac and Julia) and visitors.  (This is in addition to the gate staying open, opening and closing repeatedly, opening only half way, etc) I reported it to the management on Monday of last week but got no acknowledgement.

I have had enough of reporting things to them and getting no reaction or an ignorant, dismissive response. I keep my contacts with them to a minimum. I actually prefer the inconvenience of a gate not opening, etc etc to the incompetence and expense incurred when they send a contractor. I won’t be contacting them again.

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Obviously, her pledge to never call the management company again lasted approximately 12 hours and before long, she was back on the blower – complaining about a whole litany of problems, from squeaky door hinges to ill-fitting bin lids.

When she’s not on unofficial neighbourhood watch or pruning her roses as she observes the comings and goings, crabby Susan occasionally heads to the shops with her trusty shopper.

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Under-the-thumb Dick is a lesser-spotted beast: last seen pilfering blackberries from the neighbours’ hedgerow, while Susan looked on in glee.

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But this weekend… drama! SuDick had a new focus in the form of Troublesome New Tenants at Apartment 4.

Said tenants had a loud and raucous party on Saturday night which went on well into the early hours, disturbing both us next door and Belligerent Bill below. As I lay awake listening to their partying, all I could think was, ‘Bill is going to go NUTS’.

I briefly wondered if SuDick had heard, being on the opposite side of the building. But of course they had. How foolish of me to even question such a thing. No sooner had I sent out a general email to all residents, asking if anyone else had been disturbed by the late-night revelry, a reply came through from ever-vigilant Dick.

Hi Katy,

Some voices and light were noticeable in our (rear) bedroom. I went and listened outside 4; we heard the loud noise inside clearly. We were going to ring on their bell at the outside door, but ran into two women coming in the side door with shopping bags (midnight by now). 

I recognised one as the new tenant – her name is Nina. I had spoken to her briefly when their moving van came the previous Sat. I reminded her we’d met. I said I’d call the police if the noise continued. Nina apologised and said she’d get it quieter and that it was a one-off house-warming. (Two-off?).

Susan thinks ‘they’re trouble’. In bed (rear) we could see raised light levels and hear doors banging after 12.30 – woken up again 3 a.m. then went to sleep again. Bill this morning has mentioned the lights at 4 being on all night. They also heard the bathroom fan on all night, and Susan has now identified this fan as the hum she heard constantly in the night, as it vents over our rear deck (below some steps). I understand some lights are still on now.

Bill, I believe, spoke to the agent during the week because they suffered from noise the previous weekend, stomping and perhaps dragging furniture late in the night. Bill apparently also had an unfriendly response at the door of 4 when he went to speak to them. 

We need to tackle this PDQ. 

Dick

PDQ? I had to Google it, and it means ‘pretty damn quick’. Get Dick and the text-speak.

Bad-tempered Bill then waded in. Never one to do things by half, he’s already emailed the council’s noise nuisance squad to lodge an official complaint. I almost feel sorry for the Troublesome New Tenants; they really have no idea what they’re dealing with.

To be fair, I was going to phone the letting agent myself but now I don’t need to bother, knowing that SuDick and Bill are already on the case. Sometimes our nutty neighbours can be a blessing. They have all the time in the world to moan, rant and complain on our behalf.

But whatever you do, don’t order a Dominos pizza before midday.

Skirting The Issue

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I’m stuck in a black opaque tights fashion trap. I wear them pretty much every single day. I don’t own a pair of jeans and I don’t feel comfortable in trousers. In fact, I only wear skirts or dresses and tights. I’m weird.

Black opaque tights are the Volkswagen Golf of the fashion world – fail safe and trustworthy. I’ve begun to dislike my ageing knees but enveloped in 60 denier, all nobbles are covered (Marks and Spencer’s Autograph Velvet Touch 60 denier, since you’re asking – trust me, I’ve tried them all); I can’t even begin to comprehend a future without them.

For a couple of years, I was quite happily cantering around at work, 60 denier-clad shanks on display until… disaster! Someone at work allegedly bent over a child in a strappy top and managed to expose an inappropriate amount of cleavage. This led to a lot of serious talk from the powers-that-be, followed by a new dress code thrust into our hands – ironically, on the very same day I had chosen to showcase my rather short pillar-box red Whistles mini-skirt.

The dress code said: No strappy tops (obvs – see cleavagegate); No leggings; Skirts to just above the knee; Culottes acceptable.

Skirts to just above the knee? CULOTTES?!

One stray boob and we were all paying the price.

I trudged dismally home and peered ruefully into my wardrobe. Of my many skirts, 90 per cent fell into the category of ‘above knee’.

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I wasn’t alone. A stealth group had formed at work. Let’s call us the Skirt Crusaders. We had one thing in common: hitched up hemlines and a depleted work wardrobe.

For a few weeks, we all played it safe: trousers and pencil skirts being the order of the day. There wasn’t a flash of thigh in sight – 60 denier or not. I even went as far as purchasing a long maroon circle skirt. The husband said I looked like a member of the Amish community. I toyed with the idea of a pair of culottes but then realised that I’d look like a Victorian school ma’am. The threat of only being able to shop at Long Tall Sally hung over us all like a grey cloud.

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One Skirt Crusader broke protocol and arrived at work in a thigh-skimming grey number. In my mind, the length of it was okay. But later that day, she was summoned to the big cheese’s office and told that although she had a ‘lovely figure’, she needed to show a little more decorum in her choice of skirts. Can you think of anything more mortifying?

After the hemline hoo-ha had died down, the skirts gradually began to creep back in: an a-line skirt here and pair of leggings there. I began to wear the odd above-knee skirt again but unzipping it slightly at the back to gain a few extra inches. It’s like when you used to roll your skirt up at school – only in reverse. My long legs had become the enemy.

I’ve been on ‘Skirt Watch’ for a while now. The worries of old seem to be diminishing. My fellow Skirt Crusader decided to brave another risqué skirt the other day. I observed it quietly, with a knowing nod of acknowledgement – but later made the following report:

‘Hello Long Limbs. Well, today’s skirt was certainly borderline, with the split at the front flashing the odd extra inch of thigh. It wasn’t quite grey skirt territory but I would describe it as your boldest move yet. However, the length was tempered by the black tights and black pumps, complemented further by the black polo neck. This created a slightly deceiving silhouette. In conclusion, this particular number was passable – just.’

She appreciated my honest feedback.

There’s a new boss at work. Rumours have circulated that he’s already said, ‘I don’t want to be able to see up it or down it’. This might be a myth though.

The black opaques are still going strong.

But, for now, the red Whistles mini-skirt has gone into retirement.

My Mother-In-Law… and the Towel Obsession

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Rule no 1 of the blog: Never write about the mother-in-law.

Rule no 2: If you are thinking about writing about the mother-in-law, refer to rule no 1.

Rule no 3: If you really are hellbent on writing about the mother-in-law, make it light-hearted and humorous, and on no account mention behaviours that could be deemed obsessive or eccentric…

I think my mother-in-law has developed an obsession with towels.

I’ve been observing her growing abundance of towels for some years now. But it was only on a recent visit to the in-law’s house that the full scale of her towel-hoarding frenzy was revealed.

As I plonked my weekend bag down in the spare room, the mother-in-law said, ‘I’ve left some towels out for you… but if you need any more, there’s plenty in the spare bathroom.’

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This comment in itself was slightly concerning. There were already four towels on the bed – beautifully matched to the decor. Just how many towels did she think we’d get through in two nights?

In the en-suite, there was another pile of colour-coordinated towels neatly stacked.

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Out of curiosity, I headed to the main bathroom to see the state of play. I flung the large cupboard doors open to reveal…

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… many, many more spare towels – in every possible colour you can imagine.

It was a petsetaphobic’s worst nightmare (that’s someone with a deep-seated fear of towels btw).

Glancing around, I spotted even more towels, nestling in neat piles.

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In total, there were 37 spare towels at my disposal.

I’ve come to the conclusion that my mother-in-law collects towels like one might collect stamps or thimbles.

But I’m not sure how you would wean yourself off a fixation with towels. Cut down on the trips to Dunelm Mill? Steer clear of the towel aisle in old Johnny Lewis? Wean oneself off gradually with say the purchase of a large bath sheet, rather than a whole ‘nest’ (incidentally, who ever really wants a ‘nest’ of towels? There’s always at least two towels in there of an indeterminable size – too small to dry one’s body and too big to pass off as a hand towel.)

As far as addictions go, I think my mother-in-law’s love of towels (petsetaphilia?) is pretty harmless.

At my parents’ house, you’re lucky if you get handed a bobbly old towel, which is usually the size of a postage stamp and as stiff as cardboard (owing to the fact that they don’t believe in costly tumble dryers).

So who I am to turn down a fluffy towel or two – or even 37?

Little Lord Fauntelroy… Comes To Stay

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It’s half-term and my three-year-old nephew Max is coming to stay. Max is the apple of my eye but I still like to think that I’m a firm aunty – able to say ‘no’, when he reaches for a gingerbread man in Caffe Nero.

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The Husband, on the other hand, is a soft touch, and it took Max all of about two minutes to realise this. It’s no longer, ‘Aunty Katy, can I have a gingerbread man before lunch?‘

Oh no, he heads straight to Uncle Pushover and minutes later, re-appears, grinning like the cat that got the cream – tell-tale crumbs scattered around his mouth.

I left The Husband in charge of getting Max dressed for the morning and he managed to put his shoes on the wrong way round (Max’s shoes that is, not his own – although that isn’t beyond the realms of possibility either).

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Having Max to stay is a lot of fun. From the minute he wakes up at 6am to the minute he goes to bed, his conversation is one long series of zany questions.

‘Why do dogs have bones in their body?’

‘Can submarines live in reservoirs?’

‘What would happen if Buzz Lightyear went all the way through space and kept on going?’

‘Where do you buy your multi-grain bread from?’

‘Have all the apartments got taps like your kitchen tap?’

He also has a strange condition called Barry Scott Tourette’s – where he is prone to suddenly shouting out ‘Barry Scott’ at random, usually in a public setting. Given my recent dealings with the hate-mailing Barry Scott impersonator, the irony of this does not escape me.

My sister had drilled it into me that Max needed to go to the toilet just before he goes to bed, in order to avoid to any nighttime accidents.

‘Now, you need to go to the toilet before bed,’ I said, having overseen bath-time, pyjama-dressing and teeth-brushing.

‘I’ve tried,’ he said. ‘But nothing would come out.’

‘Can you try again?’ I pleaded, having visions of my pocket-sprung Habitat mattress being stained for ever.

‘Okay, Katy,’ he sighed, with an air of world-weariness.

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That night, there was a wail at 1am.

‘Aunty Katyyyyyyy!’

Alarmed, I scurried down the corridor. ‘What’s wrong?!’

‘I can’t see Big Ted,’ he said. Big Ted is a big teddy bear that I’ve had since I was 2 years old. He was safely ensconced under the sheets next to Max (you can see his head in the picture).

‘He’s right next to you!’ I said.

Two hours later, and there was another wail. I hared down the corridor like a scullery maid.

‘I’d like some freshly-squeezed orange juice,’ he said.

I didn’t have any oranges and I didn’t have a juicer. I fetched him some water instead.

4am. Another wail. Back down the corridor I went.

‘What is it now?!’ I said.

‘I need my curls flattening,’ said Max, patting his hair.

Curls flattening? Freshly squeezed orange juice? This was like dealing with Little Lord Fauntleroy.

The next afternoon, Max said he wanted a tuna sandwich for lunch. We bought him a tuna sandwich but it wasn’t up to Fauntleroy’s exacting standards. Apparently it had cucumbers in: slimy, green things that his delicate palate just couldn’t contend with.

‘Can’t you just pick them out?’ hissed the husband.

Driving frantically around Leeds, looking for another tuna sandwich (sans cucumber), it slowly dawned on me that far from being the firm but fun aunty, I had lost all control.

Later, I phoned my sister to tell her of Fauntleroy’s demands.

She was flabbergasted.

‘He’s running rings round you,’ she said. ‘You need to GET FIRM.’

His lordship arrives tomorrow and this time I’m determined. There’ll be no flattening of curls in the night; no thoughts of feverishly juicing ripe Valencian oranges in the early hours, and certainly no careful removal of cucumber from Fauntleroy’s dolphin-friendly tuna steak sandwiches.

He’ll be lucky if he gets a bowl of gruel before being parceled off to bed early.

You might wonder how I’m going to resist these angelic blue eyes.

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But NO-MESS aunty’s back in town. And this time, she’s getting tough.

My Parents… and the Christmas Wish List

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My phone beeps. It’s a text from the parents: ‘Please can you text us your xmas present lists.’

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Every October, my mother requests a christmas present list from me. If I don’t comply, she will keep texting every week until I give in and text back: ‘I don’t know – just get me a book!’. It’s stressful trying to come up with gifts they can buy for me.

The Christmas Present List works both ways. The parents are not keen on receiving random presents for birthdays and Christmases – for fear of ‘unwanted tat’ taking over their home. So, every year, they present family members with a wish list, that usually contains a series of strangely-practical gifts.

This was my mother’s recent Christmas present list:

  • Prestige 24cm frying pan. Argos catologue no. 861/7134
  • Egg Poachers: Lakeland catalogue no. 12116
  • Nivea face cream
  • Hand cream (Body Shop)
  • Slippers (leather)

The funniest part of this long-held family tradition is that once you’ve sourced the items off the present list, wrapped them up and popped them under the Christmas tree, my mother pretends that she has no idea what she’s getting at all.

As the presents are passed to her, she shakes the box with a convincingly quizzical expression, before feigning mock shock when she finally unwraps her egg poachers: ‘Egg poachers?! My goodness – just what I wanted!’

Despite the parents’ detailed present list, there’s still the occasional surprise come Christmas Day. Uncle Stephen (my mother’s brother) went ‘off list’ last Christmas and splashed out on one of the strangest gifts for my mother yet: a blood pressure monitor (him and my mother are a little obsessed with their cholesteral and blood pressure).

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No sooner was it unwrapped, than the whole family were strapping it onto their arms, in a strangely competitive game of ‘My blood pressure’s lower than yours’.

For my birthday in August, I was forced to provide my own present list. In the end, I asked the parents to get me an ‘Jawbone UP band’ (for more details on this device see Curse of the Cankles – my mother is completely bamboozled by its purpose), and from the sister, I requested a new hairdryer.

Being an obsessive control freak, it didn’t want just any old hairdryer. I wanted a Parlux Ionic 3200, which I had decided on after several hours of reading reviews. I even sent my sister the Amazon link to make things as easy as possible.

I suppose that if was feeling truly helpful, I could just have purchased the presents myself, cutting them out of the equation altogether, and then just getting my sister and the parents to give me the cold hard cash.

But that would mean I wouldn’t be able to slowly unwrap each present with a well-practised look of pseudo-intrigue on my face, and say, ‘Hmm, I wonder what on earth this could be…’

The Husband…. and the Euromillions Scam

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The husband left a receipt on the passenger seat of the car.

I idly glanced at it. It was a receipt from the local petrol station and said ‘Euromillions £2.00’.

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To my knowledge, the husband has never bought a Euromillions ticket in his life, let alone at 7.12am on a Friday morning.

In fact, the man I thought was my husband wouldn’t do that.

I sat and stared at the receipt for a while and thought, ‘My husband is a stranger to me.’

Entering the house, I immediately pounced on the husband.

‘What did you buy from the petrol station at 7.12am on Friday morning?’ I said clutching the receipt to my chest and sounding like Miss Marple, uncovering her spouse’s secret gambling habit.

‘A coffee?’ said the husband.

I showed him the receipt. We both stared in at it in bemusement.

‘I bought a £2.00 coffee from the machine,’ said the husband. ‘I’ve never bought a Euromillions ticket in my life!’

We pondered this for a few moments.

‘I know what’s happened,’ said the husband. ‘You know that nice Asian man at the petrol station. Well, he’s clearly putting coffees through as Euromillions tickets – and then claiming the ticket for himself. It’s the perfect scam!’

‘He wouldn’t!’ I said, aghast. ‘He’s such a nice man.’

‘He’s a true gent,’ agreed the husband, ‘true gent’ being his catch-all expression for any kind and chivalrous stranger. ‘He’s always so nice to old women too.’

‘I bet he’s nice to old ladies,’ I said, grimly. ‘He’s probably waiting for his moment to PLUNDER their building society accounts.’

‘He probably chose me as a victim because he knows I’m so gormless,’ said the husband, sadly. I didn’t disagree.

Later, the husband announced: ‘Actually, I hope the nice Asian man does win the Euromillions.’

‘But not through illegal means!’ I cried. ‘If you spot him driving past in a Ferrari next week, you’ll know he’s won – but technically that’s someone else’s money. He’s a professional conman!’

‘I’m going to get to the bottom of this,’ said the husband, fishing £2 out of the loose change bowl and scooping up his car keys.

He roared off in the direction of the petrol station.

Barry Scott… and the Hate Mail

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I received my first-ever blog hate mail yesterday – from a man calling himself Barry Scott.

My first thought was, ‘Isn’t Barry Scott that silly man from the Cillit Bang commercials, with a really loud and annoying voice?’

My second thought – upon closer inspection of his message – was, ‘Uh-oh. Forget the bathroom spray, Barry Scott REALLY hates me.’

Here’s a snippet of what Barry Scott had to say:

I have to say I have never read a more, indulgent, vacuous, self-loving load of nonsense in my life. Boastful of your life, you are without a shadow of a doubt a horrible person. It is wonderful that your problems in life are small for you, but the way you write about them is quite frankly detestable. 

I know of some people who would love their problems to be turning up late to a wedding in London, or their cleaner buying them presents, but the world most people live in, they would never consider that a problem, never mind posting it onto the internet.

I think you seriously need to do some growing up, stop thinking that people are interested in your ‘perfect’ life, and then find some compassion, and learn how to treat people.

I sat in the bath running these words over and over in my mind. Horrible person… detestable… vacuous… Isn’t it funny how one nasty email can plummet you into the blackest of moods?

I didn’t even realise strangers were reading my blog. In fact, the only people I thought read my silly ramblings was my sister and a handful of friends – more out of loyalty than anything else.

I only wrote my blog for a bit of light-hearted fun; a little hobby because I missed writing. Yes, I could write about truly worthy causes such as poverty, war, cancer… but the whole premise of the blog was just daft, everyday trivia that stuck in my head and made me want to put pen to paper.

My blog is supposed to be self-deprecating and firmly tongue-in-cheek. Does Barry Scott genuinely think that my only worries in life revolve around arriving late to weddings, my big feet, puffed-up ankles, and whether a bearded hunk catches my eye at the gym?

And how does Barry Scott define my life as perfect? What is a ‘perfect’ life anyway?

As my thoughts spiralled, I then started thinking, ‘Oh no, if Barry Scott thinks this, what if EVERYONE thinks I am this vacuous beast of a person, who truly thinks that I’m worried that my cleaner keeps buying me presents (which is – obviously – THE most ludicrous first-world problem I could possibly imagine. That was the point!)

In fact, what if Barry Scott is actually someone I know, hiding behind a preposterous pseudonym and a veil of venom?

The husband, bless him, said that you can’t take anyone who calls themselves Barry Scott and peddles shower spray for a living seriously. He didn’t even leave a real email address.

Still, Barry Scott’s message stung. I decided to delete his comments, and cheered up slightly.

Bang… and the dirt was gone. But it did leave a mark behind.

My Cleaner… Won’t Stop Buying Me Presents

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No-one likes to admit to having a cleaner.

It’s basically tantamount to announcing, ‘I’m far too important to wash and iron my own knickers. I have MINIONS who do that for me.’

But there’s no better feeling of landing back home from work to a freshly-polished floor, the ironing hanging in the wardrobe, and crisp new sheets on the bed. If I had to choose between getting rid of the cleaner or the husband, it would be a tough call.

I first came across my amazing cleaner Natalia when she advertised in the window of my local hardware store. In fact, the very same window that Dirty Harry has been looking for love. But, unlike Harry, after one visit from Natalia , it was love at first sight.

Natalia isn’t your average cleaner: she sews on buttons, mends the bedding, takes items to the dry cleaners, and runs any errands you need. She’s the most hard-working person I know.

During my Farrow and Ball decorating obsession, her husband offered to come round and help paint with his Polish friend. They only came round to weigh the job up but before you could say ‘Czesc’ (I think that’s hello in Polish) they had whipped off their shirts, grabbed a brush and started furiously painting.

There was none of this messing around with cups of tea every 30 mins, like the Brits. No, they just brought a giant bottle of Coke (Polish equivalent) to swig on the move, and worked for 12 hours flat, without even a break.

There is one small problem with Natalia (and I appreciate this is a horribly middle-class problem, in the face of world poverty and civil war) but the thing is… she keeps buying me presents.

It started last Christmas. I was busy trying to decide whether Natalia would like an actual present or would rather have an extra week’s pay, when she pitched up at the door bearing a selection of random gifts herself.

I was confused. Shouldn’t I be buying her a present – not the other way round?

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Her first present was some strange marshmallow/ Turkish delight-style sweets along with a bottle of dessert wine, which claimed to be Polish but on further inspection was actually made in Morocco.

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She also bought me an intriguing bottle of oil called ‘Sahar’, which she told me to slather all over my body after a bath. It smells of mouldy hazelnuts and every now and then I tip a bit in the bath, mainly out of guilt. For all I know, it could be the elixir of youth.

At Easter, a giant basket arrived for me, complete with daffodils, big fluffy chicks, creme eggs, and a ‘Happy Easter’ balloon.

It’s all incredibly sweet – but entirely unnecessary.

After her holiday, more bizarre presents arrived:  some chocolates that I think are Poland’s equivalent of minstrels, and a little wooden box with two ramming deer. You can make them lock horns by moving the wooden lever up and down.

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I keep the box on my desk at work to put my pens in.  Every now and then, a naughty boy in my class passes by and rams the deer together several times.

I’m already wondering what strange array of gifts Natalia’s planning to bestow upon me next.

But, as she said herself, the magic of christmas never ends!