Last Night. It ALL Happened.

It's been a tough year. I'm doing well, but it's not easy being a single parent. I'm tired a lot of the time. I'm lonely some of the time. And I have needs. And not just for a cleaner or maid or personal chef (though I seriously could use one of those).

I have needs. Other kinds of needs.

Well, last night marked a turning point for me.

Some of those needs were met for the first time.

It started with a phone call. My friend Mike telephoned the United States, and asked if I was free to take someone out for drinks.

"Why would I take them out?" I asked, "when I can drink at home perfectly well?"

"Bring him home then," he said. "I'm sure he won't mind. He just wants a bit of company while he's in town."

"Who is he?" I asked, and wondered whether I needed to change out of my Uggs.

"He's an actor. He's Australian, but he's lived in LA for a while now. You actually met him briefly when you were here last. I'm not sure if you remember, but you liked him a lot."

I thought for a moment. I was pretty shattered. I'd had a long, hard day, blogging and doing laundry and trying to get Penny the cat to take her worm pill. But then I figured: I've been a bit of a hermit lately, so I should probably make an effort.

I called Gab the Wonder Babysitter, changed from my Uggs into boots, and whacked on some lippy. For a minute I considered changing from my tracksuit pants into jeans, but I didn't know the guy, and it seemed like a lot of effort.

"What's his name?" I asked Mike.

"Soren," he said, but the line was a bit crackly.

Not very Aussie, I thought. He must be Swedish.

I drove in to the city to where Soren was staying in a hotel, and parked my car in the parking lot. The rates were exorbitant, and I worried a little. I really can't afford $80 for parking right now. Most websites only pay about $50 per blog post. But I couldn't cancel at the last moment. And besides, I didn't have Soren's number.

I walked into the lobby and checked my face briefly in the mirror. I looked okay. My hair was clean, there was no food on my top, and I didn't have lipstick on my teeth. I had the winning trifecta.

I was nervous, because I hadn't been out in so long, and also because I realised I hadn't washed my trakky pants in about a month. But I proceeded to the bar, because a promise is a promise.

The bar was empty, but for a blonde guy drinking beer. He was gently tapping his credit card on the counter. I noticed that it was from ANZ.

"Soren?" I asked. He had nice thick hair. Most Swedish men do.

He turned around. "Simon," he said, and leaned in to give me a kiss. "Don't you remember?"

It took me a second to place him, and then suddenly it hit me. "Simon! Of course! Simon Baker! How are you?"

He took me in his arms. "Let's skip the small talk, shall we?" he murmured into my ear. "I've been waiting for this for a long, long time. Shall we go straight up to my room?"

I started to agree and then remembered that I hadn't shaved my legs in six months.

"I... I..."

Simon placed a finger on my lips.

"No excuses. Just love."

He picked me up, carried me to the lift, and then up to the Penthouse where he gently undressed me. The last thing I remember before the waves of bliss rolled over me was the look of delight as he pulled down my trakky pants.

"Hairy legs! Oh yes! My favourite!"

It was, indeed, a night to remember.

Disclaimer: This post is entirely fictional. But fun, huh?

Meeting Simon Baker

Yes, it is true. After years of writing about my lust for Simon Baker (as is evidenced here, in any of these posts, and in my BOOK!), I did, in fact meet him. For real. And it was as magical as I had anticipated it to be. Except that I never had really anticipated meeting him. Meeting your celebrity fantasy man just doesn't happen in real life, you know? So I hadn't anticipated it at all.

But then it did happen. It really did.

Simon Loves Boo

So how did I meet him? Well, in an act of incredible foresight and cunning, my husband and I befriended an awesome American couple called Melanie and Michael by a pool in Fiji about seven years ago. We immediately clicked, our kids all got on brilliantly, and we've been close ever since.Mike became an Emmy award winning TV director, and Mel turned out to be a childhood friend of Robin Tunney, who plays Simon Baker's boss in The Mentalist.

In other words, contacts, my friends. It's all about contacts.

Mike and Mel organised a visit to The Mentalist set for my family during our visit to the States as a very special treat for me (and because I kind of begged them). Still, I didn't allow myself to believe it was going to happen until we were actually driving to the Warner Brothers lot, following the detailed instructions that Mike had emailed. And then it hit me.

"We're going to meet Simon Baker!" I yelled excitedly at the kids.

"Er, okay," said my son.

"You love Simon Baker!" said my daughter.

"I love Simon Bacon!" chorused Boo.

We showed our ID to the security guard at the gate and were issued with special passes, which was terribly exciting. Special passes! Oh my god! It was really happening!

Mike and Mel were waiting for us in the carpark, looking remarkably composed for people about to meet Simon Baker. (The fact that Mike has worked with a range of huge stars from Sarah Jessica Parker to Matt Dillon to Chloe Sevigny didn't seem relevant to me at all, given that none of them were Simon Baker.)

As we walked together to the stage where The Mentalist is shot, I began mentally rehearsing what I would say to Simon when I saw him. "Hey, you're my celebrity crush!" "Hello, I am a great fan of your work." "Because of your ads, I bank with ANZ!" "Hi, I fantasize about you when I'm having sex!" Hmmm. None of them seemed quite right. What about...

Suddenly, Mike interrupted my reverie.

"There they are!"

Huh? Who? Oh my god. THEM. It was them! Simon and Robin, walking right towards us. Robin was wearing her Mentalist costume of low-waisted pants and shirt; Simon was wearing his Patrick Jane three piece suit. And a luscious mane of blonde hair.

"Hi," said Robin, and kissed Mike and Mel, then turned to me and The Architect. "How are you?" she asked. "I'm Robin."

"Hi," I said, trying really hard to focus on her and not Simon. She was lovely. Okay, done. Simon time. I turned to look at him. He was gorgeous.

"Hi," said Simon, and held out his hand.

"I love you!" I cried, and kissed him full on the mouth.

Okay, not really. I'm not that ridiculous. "Hi," I said. "I'm Kerri Sackville." We shook hands. I felt good. I was in control. It was Simon, and he was gorgeous, but I was okay. So I proved I was okay. I started to talk. And once I started I couldn't stop, because I talk a lot when I'm nervous. Actually, I talk a lot all the time.

"I'm a writer," I told Simon. "I write a blog, and I write columns, and I write about you a lot." I paused for breath. "I wrote a book, too, about marriage and motherhood? And you're mentioned in it eleven times, and I brought a copy for you, but I'm not like a mad stalker or anything, it's just my thing, you know? Like Nutella? People know that I like you and I like Nutella? And I wish I'd been in the Young Talent Team. Remember the Young Talent Team?" (Yes, people, I really did say that.)

Simon held up his hand to stop me, and smiled. "I know who you are," he said. "I googled you."

Of course. He googled me.

HE GOOGLED ME.

Simon Baker googled me. That made me feel very, very good.

"Okay," I said, and grinned. "So can I have a picture with you?"

"Don't worry," Simon said. "There'll be plenty of time for that."

All right, then. If Simon says don't worry, I won't worry.

We all stood around chatting for a bit and I thought of some other spectacular things to say.

"Love the show," I told Simon, "but I'm REALLY loving those ANZ ads."

"Oh stop it," he said, and laughed. (Yes, I made him laugh.)

"But my favorite is still you dancing in that Euphoria music video," I said.

"Oh God," he said, and looked absolutely mortified.

Just then, ten year old Pinkela spoke up.

"Do you know that my little sister calls you Simon Bacon?" she asked.

"Simon Bacon!" chorused Boo. As you do.

Just then, Robin and Simon were called in for rehearsal. The Architect, the kids and I were shown inside the stage, and were given a chance to walk around The Mentalist set. It was utterly surreal to be sitting in the rooms I watch on TV, particularly the couch used by Patrick Jane.

Loving the couch

Eventually we were all ushered into a room, set up with headsets, and invited to watch the filming on video monitors, along with the director, makeup artists, script supervisors and other crew members. We were seated on director chairs with 'The Mentalist' written on the back, just like they use in Hollywood. Because... well... we were in Hollywood. I watched, entranced, as they filmed the same scene about 27 times from different angles, until I knew the whole scene backwards, and silently corrected Simon when he fluffed his lines.

Behind the scenes

During each break in filming Simon came and chatted to us, and I lapped up his words like the little puppy dog I am. After we'd been hanging around the set for about forty minutes, he beckoned to my kids.

"Come on guys, I want to show you something," he said. The kids followed him. I followed them. The Architect followed me. We all followed Simon. Simon said come on, so we came.

Simon showed my kids the backdrop behind the windows of the sets, and the lights that come on during nighttime scenes to replicate the night sky. Pinkela showed him her cartoons, and he signed an autograph for her. He seemed to love Boo, even when she persisted in calling him Simon Bacon, and he answered all of my son's questions graciously.

Simon chatted to The Architect and I for twenty minutes or more. We talked about the U.S. college system, about health care in America, about his love of Australia, about the paparazzi, and about the people who shop at Costco. I gave him a copy of my book, and told him that his wife would definitely enjoy it.

"Except that I think she's trying to get away from thinking about me," he pointed out, which just goes to prove that one woman's Simon Baker is just another woman's boring old non-fantasy material husband.

Finally, Simon posed for some photos, taken by The Architect, first with me, and then with me and the kids.

Simon Says Smile

"Dad's been replaced!" my son called out, and we all laughed, for he had no idea how right he was. (The Architect, however, probably had a fair idea.)

Simon was called back onto set, and we all trooped back to say our goodbyes. Just as I was repeating for the fifth time how lovely it was to meet him, the makeup artist came up and began powdering his nose.

"Oh great," said Simon, rolling his eyes, "I look so manly," and though I don't usually love a man in makeup, he looked pretty great to me.

"Don't worry," I said. "I'm sure you don't wake up in the morning looking like that." And then I pointed to his famous locks. "I'm sure your hair doesn't wake up in the morning looking like that either."

"It does!" he protested. "Touch it! You'll see!"

Simon said to touch his hair. Simon said to touch his hair! So I touched his hair. I even gave it a little tug. It was, indeed, very luscious.

I left Simon with a spring in my step, memories to last a lifetime, and some excellent pictures for Facebook. And the meeting was everything I could have dreamed it to be, if I ever had actually dreamed it would happen.

The weird thing, though, is that for a brief moment there, when he was chatting so easily with us, Simon Baker stopped being Simon Baker to me. I mean, don't get me wrong - the man is beautiful. But he was clearly normal. He is open, personable, and a genuine, down to earth, Aussie guy who appreciates his good fortune and can laugh at himself. He speaks with a regular Aussie accent - not the American accent of the ANZ ads - and could have been any Aussie expat who has become successful in the United States. He is a celebrity, but he is also just a normal person, who gets embarrassed, loves little kids, tells anecdotes about his family, and misses home. He is a normal person, and it is hard, if not impossible, to fantasize wildly about someone who is clearly just a normal guy.

Ah, who am I kidding. The man is a god. Simon, my fantasies live on. Thank you.

And to Mike and Mel, I love you guys xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Rapture Fail

So Saturday was supposed to be the Rapture. Hundreds of millions of believers were meant to ascend to heaven, naked and flapping their arms*. I didn't believe for a minute that the Rapture would take place, just like I never for a moment believed that the Y2K Bug would wipe out the world as we knew it**. Still, it did give me pause for thought.

How would you react if the Rapture actually happened? I mean, imagine walking outside and seeing dozens of your neighbours floating skywards in the nude.*** How would you feel? What would you do?

So far the only reactions I've experienced to truly fantastical events are on TV or in the movies, and, quite frankly, I don't buy them for a second. Whenever something mind-blowingly bizarre happens - a spaceship lands, a boy discovers he's a wizard, an alien turns up in a picnic basket - the heroes express disbelief for about 30 seconds, then accept the situation and move on. It's preposterous.

"Wow, an alien!" the lead character will cry, then shake his head with wonder, then help him back to his spaceship without a second thought. Or "We're flying!" a first-time witch will exclaim, then start to practice her technique as if she's just discovered a fabulous new cleasing bar with which to wash her face.

Yup. I don't think so. If I discovered an alien in my closet, I would close my eyes and block my ears and rock silently in a corner, convinced I was becoming psychotic and that I would spend the rest of my days in a locked room wrapped in a white dressing gown with very long arms. My brain is not geared to handle bizarre sights. I'm still freaked out by the TV show I saw about conjoined twins, and that was five years ago. An alien would utterly destroy my mind.

As for flying, well, as I would love to fly, actually put me up there in the sky and I would scream and vomit and quite probably faint with fear, which would not be at all good for aerodynamics. I get nervous on aeroplanes and they are real machines, with safety features and everything. There's no way you're getting me to trust just my wimpy little arms.

Now if the Rapture was to happen in the movies, it would go something like this:

People start floating skywards, never to be seen again. Our hero looks amazed for a count of three, after which he goes in search of his estranged wife, who he's suddenly decided he still loves. He finds her (not ascended, clearly they were both very naughty) after dodging some nasty natural disasters. They kiss passionately, and live happily ever after.

If the Rapture was to happen in my world, it would go something like this:

People start floating skywards, never to be seen again. Kerri looks out the window, screams, falls to the floor, and starts clutching her head crying 'It's a dream! It's a dream!' The Architect runs in the room and commands 'Help me find the rabbit!'**** He pulls Kerri to her feet. She runs around in circles howling wildly, before banging into a door and falling unconscious to the floor. The Architect revives her, she screams and faints, he revives her again, she faints again, and so on, until eventually he just leaves her on the floor and starts a new life with the rabbit.

Or something like that.

So what about you? How would you react to the Rapture? Do you think it would be like in the movies? Would you be freaked out by superpowers? Most importantly, do you want to fly???

*Okay, so I may have made up the flapping bit.
**(though I did, ahem, stock up on extra water just to be safe....)
***Or floating skywards yourself, though that seems a remote possibility for me...
****There's no WAY he'd ascend, the evil little bunny

My Morning Of Porn

I have a confession to make. I've been watching porn all morning.

I tried to look away. Truly. But I couldn't. I became positively addicted. I watched vid after vid after vid, so intensely excited that I forgot to eat lunch, and lost hours sitting at the computer.

The players in the porn movies weren't particularly attractive, but that didn't bother me at all. They still knew how to move, they sounded great, and besides, it was the leather and metal hardware that drew me in. I could practically smell it, feel it, taste it (okay, not taste it, I wouldn't really taste leather or metal, but it was a very vivid sensory experience).

Now, normally I'm not into porn. Watching two (or three or seventeen) people have sex in a poorly lit room after a preposterous set-up just doesn't do it for me. But this porn wasn't your standard, male-on-female-on-female-on-cable-guy sex movie. It was one-on-one, and it was incredible. And it left me frenzied with desire and desperate for more.

Specifically, the vids were woman-on-bag, and featured on a fashion website I stumbled upon. Now I've been on many fashion websites, and I've looked at many bags. But I've never before seen movies of women holding the bags, playing with them, opening their flaps and unzipping their pockets. I'm shivering just thinking about it. Click here to see!

I loved the bag porn for the same reason that anyone loves porn. I could see myself in it. When men watch porn they relate to the male star, fantasizing about having sex with the three blonde flight attendants as voraciously as he. When I watched my bag porn, I related to the women. That could be me, I thought. I could be slinging that hobo over my arm. I could be sauntering down the road with the satchel in my hand. I could be caressing that sleek, smooth leather and sliding my cell phone in and out of the handy, fully lined inner pocket ("For organisation!" the girl beamed).

It was an amazingly satisfying morning. And for those of you wondering: yes, there was a climax. I got out my credit card and bought a beautiful Calvin Klein bag, which shall be delivered to me in just a few short days.

And unlike the other type of standard-issue orgasms, my bag will keep me twitching with delight for months.

So tell me: can your porn do that?

My Ideal Man

Last night on Twitter, my friend Yvette mentioned that she wished she was married to an editor - presumably because she needed assistance editing something, as opposed to editors being so devastatingly attractive (which is not to say that they're not devastatingly attractive, but that's just the way I read it).

I can tell you right now that I wouldn't want to be married to an editor. Not because there's anything wrong with editors (quite the contrary, some of my best friends are editors (which is actually not true but I'm trying to make a point here)) but because I need editors in my line of work and there is NO way I could work with someone I'm married to. Particularly not the person I'm married to at the moment (and when I say 'at the moment', it is because if we did work together, we wouldn't be married 'in the future').

I couldn't work with my husband for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I wouldn't want to spend that much time with him (I think from 7pm to 8am weeknights and one day on the weekend is the perfect balance), and secondly I think he's really bossy and he thinks I'm really argumentative, and the combination of attitudes just doesn't make for a smooth working relationship.

However, it did get me thinking about the kind of person I would like to be married to (apart from the one I am married to, of course). And my first thought was: A gourmet chef who also loved to do the laundry. It just sounded like that would make for a pretty fun life.

My second thought was that I'd like my laundry-loving gourmet-chef to be able to moonlight as a model, because of the magnificence of his physique and the luxuriousness of his hair, but for him to choose not to, because in his spare time he prefers more cerebral pursuits such as reading philosophy (critically, of course - I don't want someone who blindly accepts any propaganda he is fed), studying architecture, and writing for publications such as The New York Review Of Books and The Australian.

I would also like him to be a self-made millionaire - something to do with internet start-up companies would be good - and to be fabulous with kids, fabulous with parents, fabulous with my friends, and fabulous with me. Oh, and a fabulous lover. But not too 'fabulous'. If you know what I mean.

A couple of other women tweeted about their ideal husbands before the evening was over. Susan wanted an 'independently wealthy orphan who can cook', which pretty much says it all. Rebecca wanted a handyman, which would be useful, but I'm thinking I could afford to pay for a handyman if I married an independently wealthy orphan. And Tara wanted a masseur, child-whisperer, gardening-guru sex god who was also a talented mechanic, Tupperware addict, and social butterfly. Which didn't seem unreasonable at all.

However, Alison's needs were more simple. "I want one that speaks, doesn't fart, cooks and cleans" she tweeted. But, as I haven't come across a man yet who fulfils all those criteria, I suspect that's as hard an ask as any.

Still, the final word must go to Jo.

"Bloody hell," she tweeted. "I just wish I was married!"

Just not to one of our men, baby. Not to one of ours.

My Logical Land Of Fantasy

My friend Stacey loves to have sex in mid air. I don't think mid air sex would do it for me but it’s Stacey's favourite position. She rolls around with her partner, hovering under the ceiling, in contortions that defy the laws of gravity. Now, obviously she doesn’t do this in real life – that would be impossible (unless, of course, she ends up in outer space, which at this stage seems rather unlikely). But Stacey, like me, has a rich fantasy life.

The difference between Stacey and me, however, is that her fantasies are without constraint, whereas my fantasies have to be plausible. Not probable, as probable fantasies would be limited to having sex with my husband in our marital bed after the kids have gone to sleep. But possible. Could potentially happen. Within the scope of (a very, very broad definition of) reality.

So this means that, unlike Stacey, I don’t fantasize about floating on the ceiling. Nor do I fantasize about having sex as some other version of myself, or being a character in a TV show, or having sex with a cartoon character (which a surprising number of people – i.e. one that I know of – do).

My fantasies all revolve around real people having sex with the real me. But even then, I can’t just sit down and let the fun begin. Oh no. Being the annoyingly literal person that I am, I need to construct a whole context around my fantasy. So if I’m fantasizing about Simon Baker, for example, I have to figure out how to get him to Australia and into my neighbourhood where he can bump into me and realise he needs to ravish me. And the difficulty with this, of course, is that even if I work out a way to get him to my front door, getting him to ravish me is a huge challenge to work around. I mean, I’m okay for a 41 year old, but why Simon would choose me over his stunningly gorgeous wife is too great a problem for my brain to figure out.

Even when it is a real (i.e. non celebrity) person who is my current fantasy, I still have to figure out the details. How do we end up alone? How do we end up in bed? Where is his wife? Where is my husband? And who is looking after the kids? It's incredibly rewarding once I actually get there, but the challenges are so enormous that I can spend 45 minutes constructing my elaborate set up, and then fall asleep before the real fun begins.

I wish it didn’t have to be like this. I wish I could just lie back and dream of Don Draper and I getting down and dirty with two glasses of Scotch and two smouldering cigarettes. And I do try. But then I remember that I don’t like Scotch, and cigarettes make me feel sick, and Don Draper wouldn’t be interested in me, and he’s just a character in a television show anyway. I guess I’ve always had a problem with the suspension of disbelief.

So what about you? Are you like Stacey? Do you do the wild thing on the ceiling? Or, like me, are you stuck in a fantasy land of logic?

You Won't Believe It...

You will not believe the day I had yesterday.

I woke up at ten(yes, TEN) in the morning, feeling outstanding. My husband had left a note on our bedroom door: "Have taken the kids to school, thought I'd let you sleep in as you looked so tired xxx". How divine was that?

I stretched, got up out of bed, walked into the bathroom, and splashed water on my face. As I looked at myself in the mirror, something seemed different. Subtle, but different. I looked... balanced. More attractive. Less... lopsided. It was...

MY EAR!!! Oh. My. God. Somehow, overnight, my one protruding ear had flattened to my head. It was like a plastic surgeon had snuck into my room overnight and pinned it back, except that there were no stiches, no scars, and it wasn't at all sore. It just looked magnificent.

I flipped it and flapped it a couple of times but it stayed nice and flat. It was a miracle. A bizarre miracle. I ran downstairs and called my friend Karen, a doctor, who told me that these things can, rarely, occur, and that I should feel lucky and enjoy my new look. Lucky? I felt bloody ecstatic.

I ran back upstairs and showered and dressed. I noticed that my jeans were a bit loose, so I stepped on the scales. I'd lost weight! In fact, I was a good couple of kilos below my ideal weight, so I made a mental note to eat a lot over the next couple of days to get back up to a healthy weight range. Didn't seem like much of a problem to me.

Half an hour later I was at the kitchen table, reading the newspaper and eating my third piece of Nutella toast when the phone rang.

"Is that Kerri Sackville?" asked an unfamiliar male voice.

"Yes, that's me. Who is this?" I asked.

"Kerri, it's Mark Jensen from Westfield Bondi Junction. How are you?" he asked.

I panicked. Had I forgotten to pay a bill? Pick up a layby? Pick up a child? Had I unwittingly stolen something from a store? Caused wilful damage? Left too big a mess in a changeroom?

"Good," I answered, cautiously.

"Kerri, I'm happy to inform you that you've won our Shopper Of The Year competition! Congratulations!"

I was stunned. "Really? What does that mean?"

"Well," he said, "are you sitting down?"

"Yes," I told him, standing up.

"You've won a $10,000 shopping voucher to Westfield! To spend on anything you like!"

My head started spinning and my (flat) ears began to ring. "Are you serious?" I asked.

"Yes I am," he said.

"So what's the catch?"

"No catch."

"When can I pick it up?"

"This morning. In fact, if you don't mind being photographed for the local newspaper, we'll pick you up in a limo and transport you to and from the store for your first shopping expedition."

I could barely speak. "I... I..."

Mark Jensen seemed to take that as uncertainty.

"I'll throw in lunch and a movie for you and three of your friends?"

"I... I..."

"Five of your friends. And free manicures afterwards."

I snorted coffee out of my nose. "Deal," I spluttered.

So that's how I came to be in a limo yesterday, with five of my girlfriends, on my way to buy $10,000 worth of clothes for me and my flat ear. In a size six. After lunch, a movie, and a manicure. Heaven.

It was unbelievable. Like, seriously unbelievable. Which of course is not surprising, as it didn't really happen. Yesterday, like every other day, I got up early, dropped the kids to school, came home, worked, did housework, picked the kids up, and kept juggling all those balls, as I do every day, whilst my left ear stuck out at a 70 degree angle, and I strained the seams of my pants.

But it could happen. Any day now.

And if not, well, at least it's fun thinking about it...

Death Of The Humming Girl

Yesterday I was working in a bookstore cafe I frequently patronise. (And yes, I know how pretentious 'frequently patronise' sounds, but it makes me seem much more Professional and Important than 'hang out in a lot').

Now, this particular cafe is well known as a place where people come to work. Children are not encouraged (at least, not by me), voices are hushed, and at least two thirds of the customers are tapping away quietly on laptops, working on anything from university assignments to hard-hitting blogs such as these.

So when I sat next to an earnest-looking girl buried in some books, a pot of yoghurt beside her, looking bland and inoffensive (both she and the yoghurt), I felt that I was fairly safe.

I was wrong.

Five minutes after I sat, having just turned on my computer and settled into my scone... I mean seat... her mobile phone rang.

Now, I have nothing against mobile phones. I own one myself. But when I am on my phone in public, I speak in my 'inside' voice. Softly. I know that people don't want to hear my conversations about wild sex and partying (using 'wild sex and partying' in the sense of 'doctor's appointments and laundry').

Well, this young lady - she of the earnest curls and bland yoghurt - used her outside voice. LOUDLY.

And she went on and on.

I couldn't glean much from her conversation, despite her tenor and convinction. Apparently she was 'sooooo there' and he was 'soooo bad', but where was there and why so bad I had absolutely no idea. Nor did I care.

After listening to her ramble for five minutes I began to feel tetchy.

After ten minutes I began to wonder if her ears were burning with all that radiation.

After 20 minutes I hoped fervently her ears were burning.

After 30 mins I hoped her brain was on fire.

After 40 mins (I kid you not) I was fantasizing about setting her on fire myself.

I felt a profound, murderous rage towards this bland, curly girl. How DARE she encroach upon my personal audio space? I was about to turn around and confront her when, like a gift from beyond, she said goodbye and snapped the phone shut.

Praise the lord! I wanted to kiss her phone (before flinging into the nearest rubbish bin). Instead, I took a deep cleansing bite of scone - I mean breath - and returned to my work.

I lasted approprimately 45 seconds.

Because then the humming started.

Yes, yoghurt-breath steel-wool-head was HUMMING. To herself. Softly, but constantly, and tunelessly, like a demented person. She hummed as she read. She hummed as she took notes. She hummed as she turned the pages. Her tiny soft hums burned into my brain.

My legs started twitching. My eyelid started spasming. My fingers started aching with the need to grab my laptop and smack her over the head with it.

STOP FUCKING HUMMING!!!!!!!!!

I glanced around at her and glared. A truly vicious glare. And she smiled, a peaceful, beautific smile.

So it was clear. She genuinely was insane.

There was nothing else to do. I picked up my laptop, raised it above my shoulders, slammed it down on her head as hard as I could, and worked in peace for the next couple of hours with her slumped on the table beside me.

Except that I didn't. I picked up my laptop, packed it away in my bag, and went home bathed in anger and frustration.

And when she called out as I was leaving and told me to have a nice day, I grinned through gritted teeth and said 'Yeah, you too'.

That's just the kind of sweet gentle person I am.