The long goodbye

I used to have the most beautiful classic car. A gorgeous red scirocco, with a black body kit, really sexy. It was a year older than me. And, when it started (which was nine times out of ten), it drove like a dream, sooooo much fun. It roared like a tiger and purred like a kitten, and I took the greatest of pleasures in thrashing teenage boy racers at the lights, the acceleration was mint!

A few months ago, HID told me it was time to say goodbye, let go, and get a more reliable, boring car. So I gave in, and he chose me another car. The night he went to pick it up, I couldn't bear to be at home. So just as well I had a night out planned! All the girls were staying with a friend for her birthday,who had a more exciting local city than us, and I had offered to give everyone a lift in my scirocco, its last road trip.

We had a fantastic night, and me being a teetotaler (and unknowingly pregnant at the time) I wasn't drinking, and we had parked in the centre to drive back to our friend's place. Now, it had been feeling a little ropey on the drive in, not the usual stuff either, so I had text HID to ask his advice. He had told me to know exactly where we were at all times. So when the car started, and we drove out of the car park into the road only to have the clutch completely go on us, I wasn't all that surprised.

A tow truck was called, they had told me there was no chance of fixing the problem, and four freezing girls awaited rescue. It's as if she knew she was being replaced, and wanted a last bit of attention! The tow truck arrived, and I knew I had to go all the way home, against our plans, as my friend did not want a clapped out banger on her driveway until we could move it. But my friend still needed to lift home, and the rest of us needed our overnight bags! We batted our eyes and abused our cleavages to get our way.

And for their trouble, gave them an £8 tip (a taxi would have cost more) and half of the birthday cake. They were happy boys. And all that talent to look at in the rear view mirror! Thus, unable to be sold due to her injuries (costing more than her value to fix), my poor broken baby sat on the driveway for months.

A few weeks ago, a man knocked on our door offering us £20 to scrap hr, it really annoyed me, I wanted someone to love her! Eventually, HID convinced me that the reason she was so hard to fix was because sciroccos never go to scrap yards. If I were to donate mine, I would make so many scirocco owners happy, and my car would live on in theirs. A great idea! So he arranged the date, and asked me to clear out my stuff.

Which I forgot to do. And when he came, I was still in my pajamas. I scrambled outside to do it there and then. The man started it, it purred like a kitten. He held the door open for me, while I began to collect my junk. I opened the glove compartment, and inside was my black strapless bra. A dilemma. On one hand, I am delighted, I thought I'd lost this after taking it off on that night out and putting it in my handbag, as it was soooo uncomfortable. On the other hand, there is no way of me removing it without your man from the scrapyard getting an eyeful.

I bite the bullet, I'm still in my pajamas, it can't be that much worse right? I carry on emptying my car, enjoying sitting at the wheel with the engine purring one last time. As I stand to leave the car, and straighten up, your an winks and says:

"It's amazing what you keep in your car, isn't it love?"

I mumble my agreement and hurry inside, to watch her final departure.

Grown.

Butterfly Flutterings

At the start of the week, I jumped in my car and put the stereo on loud when I had a funny sensation in my tummy. Gurgling of the pregnant digestive system? "Period" type pains the doctor had okayed as normal? (What a jip, aren't I supposed to get nine months off?) I couldn't decide. I didn't seem like anything to worry about, so I carried on. And I carried on getting these sensations a few times a day.

A few days later, I checked my pregnant cousin's facebook page, her status informed me she was "being kicked and prodded from the inside out". She is 20 weeks pregnant, I am 15, so I asked her when she began to feel movement, she said around week 15! An explanation for what I felt? I decided to wait til I felt it again. She herself said she wasn't sure that's what it was til week 17 or 18.

So yesterday, HID took me shopping for a treat. In topshop, we always split: me to the sales, him to topman. I had chosen and tried on a gorgeous jade green maternity tankini (£12 in the sale), and considering a butterfly hairclip, when suddenly, there were butterfly flutterings very low down in my tummy! I went to find HID to tell him, and a huge grin spread across his face and he kissed me hard. He bought me the clip.

Later, in a cafe for dinner, I felt it again. And twice at home when I was chilling out. Babies move when they are happy, or so I've read. This is my kind of baby, I'm getting responses from shopping, food, and relaxing. Baby's going to be just like mummy! Uh-oh!

Grown.

Entertainment Value

My sister works in a large department store as a "visual merchandiser", or window dresser to you and me. She is very well suited to her job, what with a bank-busting love of fashion and big names, and a pedantically perfectionist nature, to the point of, I have suspected since I became interested in psychology, obsessive compulsive disorder.

Despite the fact that said department store is quite the classy establishment, she claims her job is a constant battle to prevent the general public from undressing their manikins. Or rather, re-dressing the manikins after members of the public have left them in a state of undress.

Apparently, the most popular manikins to undress are those in children's wear and men's wear, suggesting that perhaps little boys may be the culprit of this embarrassing problem? She claims she spends a large quantity of her day pulling up trousers of manikins. What is more, some of the manikins have manipulable digits on their hands; can you guess? She also is very familiar with re-positioning the hands of her unfortunate manikins into gestures which are not considered to be rude.

So bizarrely, there are people making their own entertainment on shopping trips by "debagging" plastic humans and forcing them to swear. How very degrading! I can see it now, a six foot male manikin with his shorts round his ankles giving those who pass him the finger. What a statement. I can only assume that the people who do this are either male or under the age of ten, as surely, women can redeem enough entertainment value from the spending of money.

I will leave you with my sister's quote of the day:

"I walked into the lingerie department, and there she was, with her knickers round her ankles!"

Grown.