‘… then he ate my boy entrancers.’. Louise Rennison

      Gordy is sniffing her bottom. This is disgusting!! In front of his dad. This is kitty-porn – surely there must be some sort of helpline for this. A kittykat helpline.

      It could be called Paws for Thought.

      7:30 p.m.

      Oh, Masimo, soon we will be together and you can tell me all about Pizza-a-gogo land. The music. The art. The snogging. I wonder if they have special techniques that go with their passionate Latin temperament? I hope he doesn’t get carried away and nibble my lips off.

      7:35 p.m.

      No, I hope he does! Nibble away, Luuurve God!!

      Wednesday May 11^th

      In my bedroom 7:07 p.m.

      How many hours is it till we go to Hamburger-a-gogo? Jas will know. I’m not phoning her though.

      Doorbell rang.

      I went quietly to the top of the stairs and looked down. Crikey! Loon Alert! It was my grandad, and he was wearing shorts! Not his huge, all-encompassing grandad shorts that he wore during the Boer War, but cycling shorts. In Lycra. Good grief.

      Please, please tell me he has not taken up cycling. Please.

      I went back to my room quietly.

      Maybe if I hide behind the door they will think I am out and JUST GO AWAY.

      One minute later

      Oh, yeah. Dream on.

      Mutti called up, “Georgie, Grandad’s here!”

      I kept silent behind the door. Naomi, Angus and Gordy were all in my bed – again – doing their idiot-cat-staring-at-me thing. They had better not give my position away. It would be all right if it was just Gordon – then I might have a one in two chance of not being caught; because although one of his eyes is fixed on me, the other is glancing out the window.

      The advance loon party came clanking up the stairs.

      “Gingey, Gingey, it’s meeeeeeee, Libbbbeeeeee…Where is you?”

      I heard her huffing and puffing outside my door and doing her alarming laugh. “Hoggyhoggy. Here I come, reggy or nut.”

      Then she kicked my door and it burst open, very nearly flattening my nose.

      “Owwwwww.”

      She put her mad little face around the door and smiled at me. When, and how, did she lose her front teeth? And why did she think it was attractive to push her tongue through the gap?

      “Gingey, there you is! Cheeky monkey.”

      She threw all the cats off the bed and started tucking scuba-diving Barbie and Jesus/Sandra up nice and comfy under the duvet. I tried to reason with her.

      “Bibsy, that’s not really Barbie and…er…Sandra’s bed, is it? It’s my bed, and there’s no room for—”

      She put her arms up to me and said, “Kiss.”

      Oh, blimey. She is cute, though. I picked her up to give her a little cuddle, and she put her hand on my nose and was sort of squeezing it and twirling it around. It was quite painful, actually. Dear God I hope it doesn’t swell up.

      Grandad was the next to arrive at the open-bedroom loon party.

      He popped his head around the door and said, “Hello, love, I’ve just been to the doctor because I’ve got a steering wheel down my shorts. I said to him, ‘Doctor, will you do something about this steering wheel down my shorts? It’s driving me nuts!’ Do you see? ‘Steering wheel, driving me nuts!’ Do you get it? Do you?”

      How DISGUSTING!!

      He’s an octogenarian.

      My ears feel like prostitutes.

      8:00 p.m.

      Thank the Lord, Grandad has gone. Unfortunately not before giving me a present from his “girlfriend” Maisie. I am sorry I ever suggested that Grandad was mad. His girlfriend has reached new and giddy heights of bonkerosity. Have you ever been given knitted toeless socks? In green, yellow and purple?

      No, I thought not.

      Grandad is going to house-sit the kittykats for the week we are away.

      I said to Mutti, “Let’s just burn the house to the ground before we go. Because that’s what it will be like when we get back. Face it.”

      Mum said, “You are so rude, Georgia. You’ll be old one day yourself.”

      I was going to go put my toeless socks on to give her the gist of what I was saying about the elderly insane, but then I realised I was on a charm mission. Also, Jas’s parents were coming round in half an hour. So I said, “Shall I make some snacks for when Jas’s M and D come round?”

      She looked at me as if I had turned into a talking egg.

      Even Gordy stopped eating Mum’s mules and looked at me with one eye.

      9:30 p.m.

      Phew. Jas and I did secret thumbsie-upsies as she and her mutti and vati left. Yessssss! And thrice yesss! We are off to Hamburger-a-gogo land!!

      Jas has got one hundred squids for spendies.

      How far can Memphis be from where Masimo is? Wherever that is.

      11:00 p.m.

      All’s well that ends well. Libby is in her own bed with Barbie and Our Lord Sandra, and the big cats have been thrown outside to lay waste to the vole population. Gordy is in his basket in the kitchen. So I can get some wellearned beauty sleep. My nose doesn’t seem any more swollen than normal.

      11:15 p.m.

      Dad says that Elvis Presley lived in Memphis and he was a musician (not that you would know that from the crap songs that Dad sings). Anyway, he was a musician and Masimo is a musician, ergo Memphis must be somewhere that musicians hang out.

      Midnight

      Pray God that Dad doesn’t take his Elvis Presley quiff with him. Sometimes for a “joke” he sticks the quiff on and starts shaking his hips about. It’s disgusting – and also probably very dangerous hipwise for a man of his years.

      He and his lardy mates, the “lads” think it’s hilarious.

      It isn’t.

      12:05 a.m.

      Anyway, what do I care, I am on Cloud Nine in Luuurve Heaven.

      We go on 22nd May, which is eleven days away. I am sooooo excited.

      12:10 a.m.

      Hawkeye called me a ninny and said that I “had the attention span of a pea” but what she doesn’t know is that I have powers of discipline that would surprise a lot of people who accuse me of laziosity. When I put my mind to it I can do stuff. For instance, even though I’m tired now and it’s midnight, it is imperative that I get up and go to the bathroom and cleanse and tone my…zzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

      Thursday May 12^th

      Ten days to Hamburger-a-gogo land on the way to school

      “Jas, I am so vair vair full to the brim with excitementosity. Aren’t you?”

      “Hmmm.”