xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx There are xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx more words xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx in this xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx sentence xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx than there are xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx molecules of xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx active xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx ingredient xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx in 2,500,000 litres xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx (or one Olympic-sized swimming pool full) xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx of some homeopathic xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxx ‘remedies’ xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx xxxxxxx xxxx xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx x xx xxxxx.

But if you think two drops will make you better, go ahead.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions

Although it seems barely credible, it’s only a little over two weeks since I was at Wimbledon for the opening day of the Olympic tennis. Clutching the Centre Court ticket Mr SB had secured in the original ballot, I stood patiently in a queue waiting for the gates to open. I’d had five hours’ sleep since we’d been in Hyde Park the previous evening watching a big screen which showed us a James Bond film in which the Queen jumped out of a helicopter, although I suspect the helicopter might have been fake. Around me in the queue were tennis fans from across the globe – from Spain, from the USA, from Australia – all of whom were blissfully unaware of the creeping sense of doom we, as British citizens, felt. Surely the spectacular opening ceremony was just a fluke? Surely this whole enterprise was going to go miserably, toe-curlingly, tooth-grindingly wrong any moment now? The stadium would probably collapse. Or the Tube would break. Or the whole thing would get ruined by the relentless British rain.

So we got to the front of the queue. Mr SB had his ticket scanned and skipped merrily through the gate. I had my ticket scanned and… the machine flashed up a Big Red Cross Of Doom. “Sorry,” said the smiling volunteer holding the scanner, “It says your ticket isn’t valid. You’ll have to go down to the ticket office and get them to check it.” My ticket arrived in the same envelope as Mr SB’s. It was for the seat next to his. But I had no choice, so I waved him a wistful goodbye and trudged off towards another queue.

After 30 minutes or so, it became quite obvious that the new queue wasn’t moving. A volunteer walked past and informed us, in classic “couldn’t make it up” style, that the ticket office wasn’t open yet because they’d lost the key. This was more like it. Some classic British incompetence to kick us off in the manner we’d been led to expect by weeks of negative press coverage. We’d all been right all along. The whole thing was doomed. What had Seb Coe been thinking? It would probably be best to admit our mistake now and put everyone on the Eurostar to the Stade de France before things got any worse, as they surely would.

Cut a long story short. I eventually got in, two hours and a severely sunburnt decolletage later, and got some of the best seats on Centre Court. The tennis was fabulous: we saw Serena, we saw Roger, we saw a seed crash out in the very first match. We even saw Michelle Obama. But there were huge swathes of empty seating, most of it with the telltale pink labels denoting that these were seats reserved for the ‘Olympic Family’, who must still have been arguing about whose turn it was to make the packed lunch, or going the wrong way on the District line.

The only person with better seats was the umpire.

So far, so predictable. There were ticket problems, there were empty seats, and the media had plenty to say “I told you so” about. There were no British gold medals for the first four days. This was all just a ridiculous, overblown dream, wasn’t it?

But then. A trickle of medals began, and Olympomania began to take hold. The negative press coverage stopped, and people started banging on about how brilliant Claire Balding and Matt Baker were.

By the time we returned home that first weekend, I was wishing we’d had tickets for an event – any event – in the Olympic Park. Although it had been fantastic to be at the most famous tennis court in the world, part of me felt that I hadn’t seen the ‘proper’ Olympics. I guess I’m just greedy. So Mr SB and I started to check the ticketing website obsessively. We tried for obscure handball matches between countries we couldn’t point to on a map. We tried for basketball. We tried for diving. We tried for hockey. But no amount of hitting F5 made any more tickets appear, until…

At 1.30am, Mr SB came up to bed and announced that he’d got two tickets for the last night of the athletics competition. Not only in the Olympic Park, but in the Actual Bloody Stadium with Actual Bloody Usain Bolt. Mrs SB didn’t get to sleep for a very long time.

So, two weeks after our first trip, we went back.

And we found a city that was confident, friendly, and stunningly well-organised. King’s Cross has never been noted for its air of cheery optimism, but on a sunny Saturday morning at the end of the Olympics, it felt like Utopia. There were smiling volunteers everywhere. There were smiling Brits in Team GB shirts everywhere. There were Americans, Mexicans, Russians, Africans. And they were all there for one thing, and it wasn’t a fight.

We headed through St Pancras for the train to Stratford. Nobody checked that we had a ticket. In a vast crowd of people on the same journey to one of the most memorable days of their lives, having the right ticket suddenly seemed a bit irrelevant. What happened to the miserable, officious, bureaucratic Britain I knew and tolerated?

We got to the Olympic Park. Smiling, brilliant volunteers who seemed to know the answer to every question in the world greeted us with megaphones, with sparks of humour, and with an unflagging enthusiasm which, presumably, hadn’t budged for two whole weeks. Not one of them looked as though they’d rather be anywhere else. What happened to the miserable, reserved, incompetent Britons I knew and tolerated?

There was a moment on Saturday night, in the hysterical 80,000-strong crowd chanting, “Mo! Mo! Mo!” as Mo Farah stalked his opposition round and round the track in the 5000m final, when I had a sudden sense of what the Nuremberg rallies must have been like. Nobody in that screaming mass was in control of what came out of their mouth. We had a common purpose, and that purpose was to glorify our nation by helping a British athlete to complete an amazing achievement. But really, nobody needed us. The Games, and London, had long since taken on a happy and glorious life of their own.

I’d like to make an early prediction. This year’s word will be ‘troll’.

For those of you who may not be au fait with the expression in its non-mythical sense, the Urban Dictionary defines ‘troll’ thus: “One who posts a deliberately provocative message … with the intention of causing maximum disruption and argument.”
There’s been a marked increase in this kind of activity recently, and it’s not just confined to internet message boards and newsgroups any more…

For various reasons mostly connected with the extraordinary kindness of others, the number of people following me on Twitter has increased dramatically in the past couple of weeks. This means that more people see the things I write. On the whole, that’s a good thing, and feeds my burgeoning narcissism nicely. But it also means, apparently, that I am more available for the receipt of abusive messages than I ever was back in the bad old days when only fifty people and an online shoe shop followed me. Because this week, someone tweeted this at me: “Congratulations on making yourself sound like a dick! Im going to suggest you are a ugly lonely old bag (most probably over weight)”.

Readers familiar with the idiom (rather than the idiot; you don’t know him) will notice straight away that this message bears all of the hallmarks of the classic troll. Tweeted by someone with only nine followers, it contains an unnecessary exclamation mark; it displays only a tenuous grasp of the English language; its accusations are based on guesswork rather than evidence. (Granted, at least two of them are true, but my point is that there is no way the author could have known that. He guessed lucky, is all.)

I have to admit to being rather pleased; being targeted by a troll felt like an indication that I had Arrived in some way – see ‘burgeoning narcissism’, above – because I’ve seen famous tweeters being plagued by trolls who think that it’s a great way to get attention and gain more followers. Comedian Al Murray, who seems to be a particular target for reasons I can’t quite fathom, often shares his obvious delight at receiving such messages: a typical exchange will read “Your boring” “My boring what?” “What?” – much to the delight of pedants everywhere. But I’d rather not give a troll the satisfaction. If having their @name in lights is what they want, then that is the very last thing I will give them.

Which brings me, with weary inevitability, to the Daily Mail.

The Mail’s editorial policy, neatly encapsulated in one headline

We all know that newspaper circulations are falling as a result of online editions and social media. But, rather than bemoan its fate, the Mail has adopted a new strategy. Despite the regular sniffy articles decrying Twitter and Facebook as the worst thing to happen to the world since Hitler – or, given its editorial policy record, possibly even worse than that – it has harnessed the power of social media to feed its own need for attention. By posting deliberately inflammatory nonsense like the recent “I’m proud to be a trophy wife” article by Samantha ‘too pretty for my face’ Brick, Mail Online is now the most visited news website in the world. Just think about that. More people visit that site than any other news site on the planet; not the New York Times, not the Guardian, not the BBC. And they visit it, not because the ‘news’ it contains is more accurate or balanced than on any other site – only the hilariously deluded could possibly believe that – but because, in many cases, the Mail has prodded them into outrage with a sharp Liz Jones-shaped stick. As a result, its advertising revenue increased by almost 70% last year. Every time you click, the Mail makes money.

Trolling clearly works. But only if you let it.

After an agonisingly long wait, that second visit is now only three weeks away. Yesterday, however, we had a call to say that it has been cancelled. The owners have sold it, quickly and unexpectedly, and so we are no longer welcome.

The more superstitious among you (what are you even doing here? Shouldn’t you be fengshuing your chakras or something?) will have noticed that yesterday was Friday the Thirteenth. And to you I say: Bollocks. The date has nothing to do with it. Had Mr SB been unavailable to take the call, we would have found out on a different day. Maybe if we’d found out on Saturday the Fourteenth instead, we would have been a day too late to book an alternative. As it is, we’ve found one. So that was lucky, wasn’t it?

(This morning, I took my car for a service and MOT and deliberately parked it in Bay 13. That’s how unsuperstitious I am: I walk under ladders on purpose; I stand on cracks in the pavement. Because superstition is nonsense. The only reason that people believe bad stuff happens on Friday the Thirteenth is that they’re primed to be aware of it and so notice it more.)

Having your holiday cancelled at three weeks’ notice is upsetting. Yes, there were even a few tears. But I’ve posted before about the ridiculous exaggerated phrases that people use at times of such minor crisis, and so I refuse to be ‘devastated’ or ‘heartbroken’. I am merely ‘a bit upset’. Let’s keep a sense of proportion. After all, had I been alive 100 years ago, I might have been taking a holiday to New York, and that would have been really unlucky.

It wasn't Friday the Thirteenth then, either.

My job is based very much in the backroom. You won’t see me mentioned in the headlines about nurses’ pay, nor in the British Medical Journal. But I am a qualified professional, with a degree and hard-earned postgraduate qualifications. On my more self-aggrandising days, I award myself a total of 12 post-nominal letters (9 of which have cost me approximately £1500 to date) in all written communications. And my job is not one of those middle-management bureaucrat positions that the popular press love to mock; the work I do impacts directly on patient care and helps families to make – literally – life-or-death decisions. I care deeply about my job. I work many hours of unpaid overtime, because I want the service I provide to be as good as it can be.

Anyway. Enough of the thinly-disguised martyrdom.

In the light of today’s latest public-sector-bashing announcement from our mandateless puppet-masters, I had a conversation with someone on Twitter which made me think. He works in the private sector, though not in healthcare, and often likes to accuse me of being a ‘lefty’. If that means that I believe in fairness and equality, and doing the right thing, then: yes, guilty as charged. But if it means that I’m an anti-Tory, anti-capitalist knee-jerker, then: no. Wrong. Nothing in life is ever that simple.

There is nothing wrong with trying to save money in the NHS, or in any other public sector organisation. Entrusted with the hard-earned money of millions of UK taxpayers – and let’s not forget that, unlike the corporate behemoths cosying up to HMRC, we are taxpayers too – we have a moral duty to provide the best possible service at the least possible cost. But the taxpayer also has a right to expect that he / she is not paying tax so that private companies can profit from running services less well than their public sector predecessors did. To allow public money to go straight into the back pocket of big business, as a reward for providing services driven by cost-effectiveness (aka profit) rather than quality, is a moral crime far greater than that of paying a nurse with 40 years’ dedicated service a slightly better pension than someone who works in the private sector.

In the last two years, the department in which I work has been subject to multiple ‘efficiency reviews’ by multiple highly-paid management consultants, none of which has achieved a single useful thing – not due to unwillingness or lack of engagement on our part, but due to a lack of understanding of the specialised nature of our work on theirs. One company, paid thousands of pounds to conduct an in-depth review, has not even managed to produce a report at the end of the process. It just pocketed the cash and went away, having used up hours of staff time that could have been spent doing something productive. Ultimately, the people best placed to deliver efficiency are the people who understand the job. We do, we can, and we are.

And we, the people who work in the public sector, also have a right to expect that we will not be treated with contempt by our blue and yellow chimeric overlords. Of course the country is in dire financial straits. Of course we need to save money. But it is beginning to feel as though the Government will not stop until it has salami-sliced every public sector worker’s pay and pension down to the absolute bare minimum it can get away with, while it continues to cut taxes for the rich and to waive them altogether for the super-rich. If thinking that this is unfair makes me a lefty, then I’m going to have to change my name to Vladimir.

And then I had a Big Birthday, and did some running myself. Specifically, I ran smack into the wall of Middle Aged Spread. Not headfirst, obviously, because I was cushioned by a protruding layer of abdominal fat that enabled me comfortably to avoid a broken nose. But still. I couldn’t walk up the two flights of steep Victorian stairs to work any more without needing a lie down and a punkawallah when I got to the top. I told myself I would definitely need to get around to addressing my woeful lack of fitness, just as soon as I finished this birthday cake.

At the same time, Mr SB, being of a similarly indolent disposition and with the same fondness for carbohydrates, was becoming increasingly troubled by aching joints and a spreading waistline. We had a lot of conversations that went like this:

“We really should do some exercise.”
“Yep.”
“And go on a diet.”
“Yep.”
“We’d feel a lot better for it.”
“U-huh.”
“Yes. We should do that, then.”
“Do you want some more wine?”

And then we carried on watching the TV.

But one day a couple of months ago, Mr SB took the plunge, and went swimming. Swimming, let’s be honest, was the absolute last thing on my mental list of ‘Things I Could Do To Be Fitter And Smaller’. I come from a family of non-swimmers. When I was a kid, my family’s liking for swimming as a leisure activity was on a par with its liking for do-it-yourself appendectomies and getting arrested. Which is to say, for clarity’s sake, that we never did it. Granted, I had some lessons, but only to the point where I could just about manage a doggy-paddle without armbands. From the age of seven to the age of never-you-mind, I developed a phobia of any body of water deeper than I am tall. My deficiencies in the vertical growth department meant that this effectively excluded me from anything deeper than a medium-sized puddle.

However.

When Mr SB returned, triumphant, from his first visit to the pool, he announced that it Did Not Have A Deep End. Furthermore, it had Two Jacuzzis. I was forced to look up, startled, from my bag of doughnuts, and to consider the possibility that maybe I should give it a try after all. So, the next time, I went with him. And I put a swimsuit on. And I got in the water.

And I instantly became one of those women. You know the ones. The ones who only get wet from their shoulders down, and swim around in pairs at the speed of evolution, holding their heads up like periscopes and getting in everyone’s way. And I hated it. Not because I was scared – after all, I could put my feet on the bottom wherever I was! – but because it caused me actual, physical pain. My neck felt like someone was tenderising it.

Now, you may not know this about me, but some people say I’m stubborn, and this, I have to concede, was a case in point. I decided that, rather than give up the swimming, I would have to get better at it. (If there’s one thing I absolutely hate, it’s that feeling of not being able to do something as well as somebody else can*.) So I bought some goggles, and persevered. It may not seem like much of an achievement, but I am now swimming with my face properly under the water, and not feeling like quite such a hindrance to everyone else. The last time I went, I swam a quarter of a mile. Esther Williams I ain’t, but it’s genuinely nice to feel that I’ve conquered a fear.

Now, about these spiders…

*I gave up writing this blog for a year. You may draw your own conclusions.

This morning, it published an article in which it appeared genuinely appalled that talented, beautiful, Oscar-winning actor Kate Winslet had been seen at a premiere with ‘unsightly peach fuzz’ on her face.

Now, at this point, I was going to insert some quotes from the article, the general tone of which suggested that Ms. Winslet had turned up with, at the very least, a full Dick Strawbridge moustache with matching sideburns. However, when I came to insert a link to the unutterable vileness, I discovered that the article was completely different from the one I’d read with such annoyance at 6 this morning. Gone were the half-remembered references to ‘letting herself down’ and ‘perhaps if she’d put her makeup on more carefully’, to be replaced with a much more flattering piece about how lovely her dress was. I began to wonder if I’d imagined the whole thing.

Thankfully for the sake of my sanity, though, a helpful blogger has posted the original here - every last horrid, grubby word of it. And by way of comparison, for those of you who don’t mind giving the Mail the satisfaction of a click, here’s the updated article.

So the Mail has clearly thought better of its snide little bitching session, but the fact remains that, at some point, someone on its staff thought that the presence of a little bit of downy skin on an actress made for a good news story. It may have escaped the Mail’s attention, but we have just effectively declared war on one of the most dangerous men on the planet, there has been a devastating natural disaster in the world’s third largest economy, and there is a Budget tomorrow. How, then, is the slightest of slight cosmetic faux pas on the part of a celebrity a good use of column inches in any way?

And who cares, anyway? Personally, I find it quite comforting that impossibly glamorous A-listers really aren’t as perfect as they appear; that Julia Roberts sometimes forgets to shave her armpits (which, for the information of any boys reading, is The Most Pointless And Annoying Girly Ablution In The World – have you ever stopped to consider how difficult it is to see properly under your own armpit, or who first decided it was necessary anyway?), that Kate Moss has cellulite, and that La Winslet has better things to do than to wax her face every day lest anyone spot that she is a Real Person With Real Skin. So if newspapers insist on publishing this kind of story, I’d rather they did it with a reassuring, ‘see – famous people are just like you and me, and we still love them because they’re talented and human’ than with a sneering, smirking unpleasantness and a pointing, inky finger.

But the reporters are probably all too busy waxing their own faces and scrubbing their elbows with a pan scourer to think about it as deeply as that. Because I’m sure that every tabloid journalist always makes a very special effort to look perfect in public… aren’t you?

It’s worse than any of that. Because, you see, what we have done is this:

We have bought tickets for A Festival.

I don’t know whether it was the Big Birthday last year that did it – probably not, because that would make it an Impending Midlife Crisis, which this definitely isn’t, obviously - or what, but I decided a while ago that I really, really want to go to a festival properly before I actually do turn into my mother. At the moment, I can just about still cling to the belief that I, too, can be one of those girls who manage to look glamorous in the mud even though they haven’t had a wash for three days and they’re wearing wellies; but if I leave it much longer, then I will officially be middle-aged and that, I fear, will be that. I will have to invest in tartan slippers and Damart, and you can’t get away with wearing those at a festival unless you’re Kate Moss.

So I persuaded Mr SB that we should go to Latitude (on the grounds that it didn’t seem quite so intimidating or as far away as Glastonbury, and that half of Twitter went last year and seemed to enjoy it). From what I had read, it seemed like it would be a suitably gentle introduction. There would even be ballet, for heaven’s sake.

And then, last night, they announced the line-up, and I suddenly felt quite old. I have heard of hardly any of the bands (do the young people still call them ’bands’, or have I already made a dreadful error that instantly picks me out as an Unbeliever?), and, with a couple of exceptions, the ones I have heard of are throwbacks to my youth*. So I had to spend the evening typing improbable phrases like ‘Esben And The Witch’ into Amazon, and trying to judge how many of the bands I might be able to listen to without saying, “What’s that appalling racket?” and complaining that I couldn’t hear the words properly.  

And actually, most of them were a pleasant surprise, and I think that, with a few judicious album purchases, I could be rescued from the brink of terminal Radio 4 listenership, and could come to feel that I have as much right to be at Latitude as all those young people at the front who know all the words. Of course, the reality is that I am emphatically not going to be one of those glamorous girls you see on the telly; I am going to be the fat, greasy-headed, middle-aged woman standing at the back moaning that she can’t see, and that the wellies are pinching her calves and making her feet hurt. But at least I might enjoy the music, and even if I don’t, there’s always the ballet.

*I spent a good five minutes bellowing ‘Enola Gay’ across the living room in an attempt to explain OMD to Mr SB, who is just too young to remember them. I’m pleased to say that my rendition, whilst not extraordinary, was sufficiently torturous to make him confess that he had, in fact, heard of them, after all.

Back in 2005, it was still a bit embarrassing to admit that we’d found each other at the online equivalent of a livestock auction; but six years later, internet dating seems to attract far fewer raised eyebrows. Regular TV adverts promise a money-back guarantee to idealistic singletons who fail to find Mr or Miss Perfection in six months*, which seems ludicrous; but if the matches are based on compatibility questionnaires and photographs considered rationally in the cold light of day, rather than irrationally in the hot, sweaty light of a nightclub after eight Flaming Sambuccas, then why shouldn’t it work?

I’ll tell you why not: because questionnaires don’t ask the right questions. A typical dating profile will include information about your prospective partner’s taste in music, their occupation, their hobbies, their religious beliefs, their political opinions. None of that matters. Not many couples split up because one of them likes Stravinsky and the other likes ZZ Top, or because one goes flower arranging on a Tuesday night while the other prefers snowboarding at the local dry ski slope. In fact, differences like these can be a good thing.  Who wants to live with someone who brings them no new horizons to explore?

He might look lovely, but do you really want a man who makes you sit on the floor?

What actually matters is not similarities between arbitrary hobbies and interests, but similarities between non-arbitrary, immutable aspects of each other’s behaviour. And so what the compatibility questionnaires should really be asking is:

1. You see a pair of dirty socks on the living room floor. Do you: a) sigh, curse under your breath, pick them up and put them in the laundry basket; b) roll them into a ball, spend ten minutes playing basketball with them, then accidentally leave them in the yucca pot when the phone rings; or c) what socks?

2. You are preparing for a romantic night out with your partner. Would you prefer to: a) go to a smart restaurant with creative, adventurous food and an extensive wine list; b) see something challenging, yet ultimately uplifiting, at the theatre, then have a few drinks at the champagne bar next door; or c) spend an hour and a half rummaging through your wardrobe for an outfit that doesn’t make you look like a premenstrual hippo, then burst into tears, put your dressing gown on, and demand that your partner orders a Chinese?

3. You are booking a holiday.  Is it most likely to be: a) a relaxing all-inclusive break on a tropical island; b) backpacking in the Himalayas; or c) a three week caravanning tour of The Historic Churches Of Northamptonshire?

4. You need to find your driving licence. Which of the following is most likely to describe the search: a) no problem - it’s in the fireproof safe under the stairs, the key’s at the left hand side of the third drawer down in the sideboard, under the Travel Scrabble; b) it might take a few minutes - I had it the other week when I collected that parcel, so it’s probably still in my handbag, or I might have put it back in the box on top of the wardrobe; or c) fuuuckitmustbeheresomewhere?

5. You are grocery shopping with your partner. Are you most likely to: a) take a list printed off from your computer – after all, you buy pretty much the same stuff every week, so it’s easier just to tick the things you need than writing it down every time; b) buy food for the week according to what’s on special offer when you arrive, with a few little treats for the weekend; or c) take the trolley and wander off to look at the electrical items while your partner carries armfuls of toilet rolls and economy carrots round the freezer section like a bewildered, irritable Sherpa?

6. Is your perfect partner: a) a true soulmate - someone who shares my dreams, ideals, and love of nineteenth-century Ukranian poetry; b) someone with the face of George Clooney, the body of Rafael Nadal and the mind of Stephen Fry; or c) someone who doesn’t smell like too much a dead badger and who might be willing to put the bins out sometimes?

See, all you really need is a little honesty.

(*for the record, it took me three years, and Mr SB one week. It’s just possible that one of us is much pickier than the other.)