‘…startled by his furry shorts!’. Louise Rennison

back, head high, swing swing. Loosey loose arms and swing swing.

      12:52 a.m.

      Yep, I definitely look confident. There is one tiny drawback, though: hanging my arms loosely and swinging them makes me look like an orang-utan. An orang-utan called Ralf, probably. And who wants a confident orang-utan as a girlfriend? That is what I ask myself.

      12:54 a.m.

      Ralf the confident orang-utan wearing Teletubbies pyjamas. Which I only wore for comfortnosity. I had no idea I was going to have to go out to a party in them looking confident.

      Shut up, brain.

      Sunday June 19th

      My bedroom

      10:00 a.m.

      Same rack of love.

      Same oven of pain.

      Same bakery of… shutup shutup.

      I would usually consult with Dave the Laugh about the Luuurve God scenario. He is after all the official Hornmeister and Pants King. It still makes me laugh like a drain when I think of him singing, “The hills are alive with the sound of pants!” I would ask him to give me the benefit of his wisdomosity about boys and so on, but he’s gone a bit weird with all that “What if we should have really been together?” fandango, so I feel a bit funny about seeing him again.

      11:00 a.m.

      Mutti popped her head round my door. “We’re going to Waterworld. Do you want to come?”

      I said, “Are you mad?”

      I said it in a polite and inquiring way, but she still went ballisticisimus. “You are so bloody rude.”

      I very nearly said that swearing shows a lack of vocabulary, but I didn’t because I am so vair vair tired.

      11:30 a.m.

      The Swiss Family Mad have “roared” off in the clown car – otherwise known as Dad’s ludicrous three-wheeled Robin Reliant – leaving me alone at Château Sheer Desperadoes.

      11:35 a.m.

      I’m going mad. I am going to have to phone The Big Knickered One, and hope she doesn’t ramble on about bat droppings.

      Phoned Jas.

      Jas was so much in Jas ‘n’ Tom land that she didn’t even notice I was in the bakery of pain. She just went on rambling for Europe. “Oooh, it’s so groovy that Tom’s back!

      I only saw him briefly yesterday. He is going to bring around his flora collection from Kiwi-a-gogo land in a bit and that will be soo… oh…”

      I said, “Indescribably dull?”

      She said, “I have to go now.”

      “Jazzy Wazzy, can I come and see you? I need your help.”

      “No.”

      Jas’s bedroom

      Lunchtime

      I am lying amongst Jas’s sad collection of stuffed toys, mostly owls, while she ponces around in front of a mirror. What is she doing?

      I said, “Jas it’s very distracting trying to tell you stuff, important stuff full of tragicosity about me your very bestest pally, when you keep pouting like a goldfish. What are you doing?”

      “I’m practising puckering.”

      “What?”

      “Puckering. I had, well, a bit of a problem vis-à-vis snogging with Tom last night.”

      Despite my world coming apart at the seams, I am always interested in snogging tales. “Tell me.”

      “Well, I was quite nervy at first when I was waiting for him.”

      “Were you doing your annoying flicky-fringe thing?”

      “I don’t know; anyway, when he came in, I was sort of jelloid. But then it was all right because he got his whatsits out.”

      “Pardon?”

      “His, you know, snapshots from Kiwi-a-gogo land, so we looked at them for a bit. Until I felt calmed down. Actually there was a really cool one of Robbie…”

      Oh brilliant. On top of everything else I was now talking about someone I had vowed I would never talk about this side of the grave.

      I said, “Was Robbie playing the guitar and dancing with marsupials?”

      Jas wasn’t even listening. “Anyway, as we were looking at them Tom got closer to me and put his arm around me. Then we, well… we, you know, started snogging and so on.”

      “And so on? Where is ‘and so on’ on the snogging scale? What number did you get to?”

      “Er… five and a bit of six. It was really groovy. I felt like I was all melting in to him and then… well… then I had sort of a lip spasm.”

      “A LIP SPASM?”

      Ten minutes later

      Apparently she had been snogging away when she had suddenly had the lip spaz.

      She said, “I got cramp in my lips and they sort of seized up.”

      “What does that look like?”

      And she showed me. Blimey. You know when you put food in a baby’s mouth and it doesn’t like it, and its eyes go all goggly and then its whole face goes into a spasm and the food comes shooting out of its mouth? Well, even if you don’t know, believe me, I do. Libby could make rice pudding reach the other side of the room.

      While Jas was showing me her spazzy face, I said, “If you don’t mind me saying, Jas, that is not very attractive.”

      She said, “I expect it was snogging withdrawal. I hadn’t puckered up for ages, so… you know, being out of practice… but it won’t happen again.”

      “Good.”

      “Because I have an exercise regime now. Shall I show you?

      “No.”

      “OK. It goes pucker, relax, pucker, relax, pucker, relax. Do you see?”

      I didn’t say anything, just lay there staring at her with big starey eyes like the rest of the owls as she pouted her lips and then relaxed them. She looked like a mixture of Mick Jagger and an idiot. Not necessarily in that order.

      She was in full ramble mode now. “And then for the pièce de résistance it’s darty tongue, darty tongue.”

      God, it was horrible sitting there while her little tongue went in and out like a mad vole. Fortunately I was able to shove a Midget Gem in her gob so that I could tell her the sad tale of my Italian Stallion.

      Ten minutes later

      She said (chewy chew), “So you said that he had to be your one and only boyfriend scenario or else that was it? Arrivederci, Masimo?”

      I said, “Yes, but…”

      “Well, what in the name of Slim’s outsize pyjamas were you thinking of? Are you mad?”

      “No, I’m not mad, Jas. I just happen to have a friend who looks a lot like you who said, ‘Just be yourself.’”

      “What?”

      “You said being yourself and genuine was like having a