Me-Time

I am away from the Axis this weekend, staying with some friends in Glasgow who are mercifully childless and who live in a beautiful flat where alcoholic drinks and Swiss Army knives can be kept inches from the floor with complete impunity. There have been whole meals eaten without screaming. There was the best part of an afternoon spent walking without anyone falling flat over and needing a hosing or producing any other uncleanable messes. There have been many moments of peace and quiet this weekend, which have utterly baffled me. What on earth did I do with myself before the arrival of the Axis?

One of the things I never used to do, but enjoy now, is a good long soak in a bath while the children are somewhere else. Peace, tranquillity, a great big sigh in a tub. Oh, lovely. Although I was very nearly put off the experience altogether by the 2-year-old Pie and his father when I was six months' pregnant with the Kong (who, yes, was called the Kong in utero).

Having had another delightful day of puking and horribleness I was lying in the bath, wincing at the weight of the Kong squirming about in his bag, and was finally beginning to feel a little better. Pie was downstairs with his dad, who still lived with us then, and they were playing some sweet little game...until I heard a splash, a screech, some bad language from Daddio and then the pair of them thundering up the stairs. Not good. Even worse when they burst into the bathroom, the Pie under his dad's arm like a side of beef, covered in mud and yelping. I struggled to sit up, but being heavily pregnant in a small bath I succumbed to the beached whale effect and made my protestations inches from the bubbles. 'What the hell are you doing?' I asked Daddio. 'Get him out of here!' Pie was wriggling out of his clothes, aided roughly by his father. 'THIS BOY...' began Daddio, but words obviously failed him and he finished the sentence by shaking his head in disgust. Stripping the Pie naked, he dumped him unceremoniously in the bath and then sat back, arms folded, still shaking his head. I was furious at my calm being invaded, but this was as naught compared to my feelings about what happened next.

For the wretched Pie, plonked in my lovely bath, stood up, howled once, peed on me, then splashed back down. And I am absolutely certain I heard the rotten unborn Kong laughing in my stomach.