So, it’s been a lovely weekend 😊. I didn’t go to A&E once! I didn’t have to come home early! None of us yelled! The birthday girl barely shed a single tear (she’s two!) and didn’t run away from me once 😍. Progress.

Weekend Total Relative count: FIVE(and me)! Four main protagonists, two walk-on parts. 😊. Very Enid Blyton without the inappropriate stuff.

Mother is on holiday which I feel must be added for full disclosure. It might have assisted us a great deal. I’m sure she’s having a lovely time though. As did we. Sometimes things are better that way.

I’m very grateful to my sister and her husband for making such a nice little person, I know that in a few short years she’ll tower above me but for now, she’s little and her sentences are earnest yet make no sense. I can relate. I suspect she’ll always be nice.

All good stuff. Plus we watched Nanette (if you haven’t, you really should, google it) and I’ve decided to finally get Netflix. The two are only slightly connected.

On that, (Nanette), the fact that society prefers us to remain silent about how it really feels to live through pain unless we can make it palatable or funny makes me sad. I’ve talked about this before. I will again. Share your truth. It helps others feel less alone and might stop us repeating learned patterns, even seemingly innocuous ones. It empowers others to stop it happening again and it gradually disempowers the scared and the ignorant so they’ve nowhere left to go with their prejudice and they can no longer take advantage of the vulnerable. Let’s make it too difficult for them.

Back to nonsense, I’m still focused on building that bridge across the Channel. Or maybe a branch off the Eurotunnel? Or are there submarines I could catch half-way across? I definitely would prefer an easier way to see more of my niece, it’s tough being so far away from people you like. I’ll work out who to start lobbying.

So I purchased 6 very similar shades of (pink) nail polish in the tiny airport shop on my journey home.

I think this was partly a test of eyesight and colour – they do look different to me – which of course didn’t really necessitate the purchase of them. Secondly then, it’s to motivate me to get the drill out and probably ask for some help, as the drill is heavy, to reinstall my existing shelves of polish (you’d probably already guessed I have too much already) and put up the new one, which has lain empty in my room for many many months. Yes, it’s nothing to do with my shopaholism. Not connected at all 😳.

So I’m on the plane back home and apparently the pigs don’t work on a Sunday (fair enough) so instead they (the stewardesses, not the pigs) had a conversation at the back about who the heaviest and lightest passengers were (it wasn’t obvious, the weight of each passenger) so they could move them (ideally with their co-operation or if not with a special hoist which I presume is normally used for the pigs) into strategic positions around the cabin.

Apparently these people also get paid in tomatoes for being so accommodating. I am unsure if they get paid their body weight in tomatoes or just a fixed quantity. I hope it’s the former, it seems more fun. However I don’t think equality laws let you pay people accordingly to their size. I suppose it could create all sorts of complications and probably there would be a protest. Also, you can’t volunteer to be hoisted, although I’ve seen people try.

The safety guidance otherwise was very straightforward. It wasn’t anywhere near as funny as that one on YouTube from somewhere in the USA on a SouthWestern plane. I was very reassured by this. There’s a time for comedy and a time for safety briefings.

The plane was so small, I also had a choice of closest exits. I really needed a piece of string so I could measure and check; like when you play garden bowls and everyone’s convinced the red and the blue are both the same distance away but you – being red – want to prove yours is the closest. I did worry that asking for a piece of string and doing that measuring might highlight me as a ‘passenger to watch’. Plus they probably didn’t have any string. I just went for the one on the left should I need it and was then able to relax and enjoy all the remaining 35 minutes of the flight and my completely superfluous bag of Maltesers.

I think I thought that only buying nail polish would make me look odd. If I like the stuff so much, why didn’t I do my shopping on the mainland earlier? The cashier might have thought. So the Maltesers successfully diffused the (imaginary) tension but did make me feel a bit sick.

I spend a lot of my time trying to do pointless things to make me seem more normal while simultaneously being weird. I don’t even think they cancel themselves out. I should just give up. Concede victory (or defeat?) and accept myself for what I am. That feels better. No Maltesers next time.