Someone said to me the other day that people don't photograph their second child as much as they do their first. Judging by the past week with Shimona, I'm not sure that's true. Admittedly, I don't expect our new baby to set up home in the tumble dryer...


... but even when she's just lying asleep on the sofa, she's being constantly snapped by either me or Amelie. It's verging on harassment. On this evidence, our unborn child might need a restraining order.

But tumble-tots aside, I successfully made it up to Horsham today and sniffled my way through a clinic. I don't really have much to say about that. Mainly because my throat's too sore. I think I need a holiday.

As for my last day off work, that was spent very pleasantly yesterday, with a visit to our good friends Stefan and Andrew. To be honest, I don't have much to say about that either. Not because it wasn't lovely, interesting and stimulating, but because most of what we talked about can't be repeated. At least not without the threat of legal action. But fortunately a picture paints a thousand words, so here's a paragraph or two...


What I can say is that if you want someone to spray-paint a cake silver, then Andrew's your man. Stefan baked us a home-made banana cake, which despite being richer than Rockefeller, lacked a certain something. Namely a metallic sheen. So as the Johnnie Cradock to Stefan's Fanny, Andrew got hold of some edible spray paint, and coated the whole thing in silver. It gives new meaning to the phrase 'plating up'.

After the last time we saw them, we were naturally cautious about accepting any offers of food, in case it contained vacuum-packed bird offal, but as it transpired, the cake was very nice. As were the biscuits I kept eating when no one was looking.

In addition, Stefan and Andrew were their usual generous selves. Not only did they let Amelie share their wind-up racehorses and Bugs Bunny DVDs, but they also gave her a goody bag filled with crayons, colouring books and a personalised CD of Amelie-related songs.

Apparently they do lots of different ones. But not Phil or Lisa. You have to draw the line somewhere.

It's very good though. She's insisting on listening to it at full volume as I type this, which is slightly distracting. It's one thing having your daughter playing loud music in the living room, but somehow worse when all the songs are about her. Mind you, I suppose it's no different to me playing 'You Sexy Thing' by Hot Chocolate.

Let's face it, if the owners come forward to claim this cat, someone's going to be gutted...


And that someone is Lisa. Amelie might be the one in all the photos, but behind the scenes, Lisa's more attached to Shimona than any of us. She's spent most of the week cooing and fawning over that cat like it's a newborn baby. I feel like I've been on paternity leave.

Tragically, due to a chronically deprived childhood and a mother who refused to buy her a puppy, Lisa's never really had a pet of her own. And she's not getting her hands on Chloe. So Shimmy's become the cat she never had. Amelie might be the one falling over the back of our headboard in an effort to stroke her on the windowsill, but it's Lisa who's taken Shimona to her heart. She's not prepared to empty the litter tray or get cat food on her hands, but other than that, she's devoted. She's like Joy Adamson in Born Free. Except she won't let the cat go.

So while Lisa was acting like a lovestruck teenager, Amelie and I did the responsible thing by heading down to Asda yesterday for the third time this week. We wanted to get some more Felix while it was still on special offer, but we also had some important charity work to undertake. There's a collecting box at Asda for 'Lost Cats Brighton', where people can donate food to help rescued cats in need. So Amelie and I stood there, posting all the pouches of food that Shimona had refused to eat. There were quite a few, so it took a while. But it gave me a warm feeling to know that within a day or two, that food will be presented to homeless, starving, perhaps desperate cats. Who'll probably turn their noses up at it too.

Obviously my week's annual leave has been pretty much hijacked by cat-related activities, but we did manage to squeeze in one other activity: Amelie's second swimming lesson. When we first took her a fortnight ago, they gave us ninety minutes for £3. This time we got two hours for the same price. And while other children left halfway through, Am stuck it out til the end. By the time we got her out, she looked like a bleached prune.

But a bleached prune who can swim. I have to say, I was amazed at how much she's come on. Two weeks ago she took ten minutes of persuasion just to enter the pool. This time she was paddling about like a pro...


I was only brave enough to break the no-camera rule for twenty seconds, so that's the only footage I have, but it's one in the eye for the midwife's ski-ing trips.

On the downside, we're lucky she ever got dry. Lisa did her bit for German culture by leaving Amelie's towel on a bench while she was in the pool, but by the time she came out, it had gone. The staff couldn't find it, so it appears there's a linen thief in town. It's probably being hawked around the car boot sales as we speak.

The good news, however, is that whilst Amelie left considerably lighter than she arrived, I came away with more than I bargained for. I might have avoided the verucas in the changing room, but I picked up a nasty cold in the café. I woke up this morning with razor blades in my throat, a splitting headache, and a tendency to sneeze every two minutes. Horsham, here I come!

Since June 2010, when Amelie was twenty months old, and discovered that she could pick up Chloe using nothing more than speed, persistence and a pair of turquoise cat-wrangling trousers, she's dreamt of owning a cat that would sit on her lap without being pinned down by physical force. And now, two years and a lot of failed attempts later, she's finally got what she wanted...


That girl's in cat heaven. She can't believe her luck. On the downside, however, her hands are so covered in scratches, she looks like a self-harm victim.

It's not that Shimmy's aggressive, she's just a young cat who's barely more than a kitten, and as a result, she thinks everything's a game. We've explained this to Amelie, and she understands that her cat's playful, but unfortunately the girl knows no fear. Her hands might be cut to ribbons, but she can't keep her fingers away. Interestingly, no matter how much she gets scratched, it doesn't upset her in the slightest, because she loves Shimona so much. She got scratched on the chin yesterday, and burst into tears for the first time. Not because of the injury, but because Lisa picked her up and carried her away. She was sobbing through the tears, "I want to go back to Shimona!"

Lisa went out to meet a friend yesterday, so I decided to take Amelie over to the new Pets at Home superstore in Hove. Lisa had suggested that we buy Shimmy a basket. I told her that she'll never use it, because she loves sitting on people's laps so much. Suffice it to say I was wrong...


She's barely been out of it since we got the thing home.

Admittedly, Chloe looks a bit grumpy about it...


But to be honest, she always looks like that. She might not have an eight quid bed, but she's had £400 worth of vet treatment, so she can't complain.

As it happens, the Pets at Home superstore was well worth a visit. It was like an animal park with no entry fee. Amelie got to see rabbits, hamsters and lizards (not all in the same cage), and learnt the words 'degu' and 'oranda'. We were particularly impressed with their fish department. They might not have had any battered cod, but they were selling Doctor Fish for £4.99 each, or two for £9. Having experienced their healing powers for myself last year, I considered getting a dozen, then buying a washing up bowl from the pound shop, and setting myself up in business for fifty-five quid.

It was at that precise moment that I received a text message from work, asking if I can do a clinic in Horsham on Monday. I took it as a sign that I should be my own boss. And then replied and said yes.

We left Pets at Home to go home to our pets, but changed our plans en route, and headed to Asda instead to buy a different brand of cat food. Frankly I've given up with the Tiger and Opticat. Whilst in the pet food aisle making umming and erring noises, we encountered an elderly lady with a similar turn of phrase, and ended up having a lengthy conversation about fussy cats. To be honest, it was like talking to myself. She told us that she's had her cat Elkie for a few months, and that as a rescue cat, she should be grateful for anything she gets. But needless to say, she's not. The lady was back for the umpteenth time to try a different, even more expensive, brand. She said that after the last time, she told Elkie she's not getting anything else, and that if she doesn't eat it, she can starve. I told her I'd had the same conversation with Shimmy. And yet there we both were.

Fortunately, I hit the jackpot. Having compared notes with the old lady, I plumped for some Felix 'As Good As It Looks' Doubly Delicious in Jelly. And Shimona loves it. So much so, that I'll be heading back there today for some more.

In the meantime, I think I'll hand over this blog to Amelie. She asked if she could borrow my camera yesterday, so I reluctantly gave it to her (mainly to avoid a tantrum), and she disappeared for ten minutes. Which was a blessed relief. When she came back, she'd taken 36 photos of Shimona and Chloe, and amongst them was this one...


I'm genuinely impressed with that. She can take all my photos from now on.

According to this website, the name Shimona comes from Hebrew, and means "hear, listen". Which is ironic as we met her on the way back from a silent film. She's certainly made her voice heard since though. And it appears to be telling us that she doesn't like cheap food.

Naturally, as a former stray, you'd imagine she'd eat anything, so I popped down to Asda on Wednesday and bought her some of their own brand Tiger food. She won't touch it. She will, however, eat Chloe's expensive renal food. And fresh tuna. So yesterday I tried her on Lidl's Opticat range. She won't go near that either, but I told her she's not getting anything else, so I left it down on the floor. Until Chloe came along and ate it.

So I've got a stray cat who won't eat anything but the best, and a Persian with kidney failure who loves cheap Lidl food, but isn't allowed to eat it. My Mum has suggested that maybe Shimmy was owned by a little old lady who used to cook her fresh meat every day, and I'm beginning to think she's right. Not only was she sniffing around the oven a lot yesterday, but she seems to prefer Lisa to me. Which is madness when you think about it.

Lisa and I are getting used to the name Shimona now, which is ironic as Amelie keeps forgetting it. When she got up yesterday morning, she couldn't remember what she'd named the cat, but she knew "it was something unusual". Lisa and I attempted to fool her by suggesting some names that we'd prefer, but she wouldn't have it. She didn't know what it was, but she knew what it wasn't. She pointed out on Wednesday that Shimmy looks a lot like Tabby McTat, so whenever she forgets the name, she tends to call her Tabby. In fact, her first words as she walked through the door after nursery yesterday were "Now... where's that Tabby cat?". The two have become inseparable.


Shimona's not the only new arrival to be taking up our time though. There's also the matter of our unborn baby. Lisa had to cancel her midwife appointment last week due to uncontrollable vomiting, but the good news is that it was rescheduled for yesterday afternoon. So with Amelie at nursery and me on annual leave, it meant I could go with her. Lisa has to venture into the depths of Whitehawk for her midwife appointments, which are held at the Roundabout Children's Centre, a council-run facility that was opened by the Queen at 2:45pm on Thursday, 8th March, 2007. I know that, because I mentioned it on my blog. Little did I know that five years later, I'd be following in the Queen's footsteps.

It's actually a very nice place. Think of it as a prefab teepee with stairs. Their noticeboards are full of posters advertising numerous local groups, including one for Dads under 26, and another for Mums aged 16-18. That one's called 'Little Pickles'. I'm not sure if the name refers to the babies, or the mischievous tykes who got pregnant.

I'd just started reading a leaflet entitled 'Keeping Love Alive After Your Baby', when we were called in. So I'll never know if they recommend affairs. But the good news is that the appointment went well. The midwife listened to our baby's heartbeat, which was coming through like an express train, and then sent Lisa off to wee on a stick in the bathroom. While she was gone, she asked me if we had any plans for the weekend, so I told her we're taking Amelie swimming. I mentioned that although she's almost three and a half, we've only just started going.

The midwife sympathised, and said that despite the best of intentions, it's often hard to get around to these things. She said it was the same with her five-year-old son. Before adding "But we love our winter holidays, so we take him ski-ing all the time". That pretty much trumped my £3 swimming lessons.

I think we might have a new member of the family...


Amelie loves that cat so much, she's practically spooning it at bedtime.

Even Chloe can't tear herself away...


It's like a scene from 'Ebony & Ivory' being played out in our living room.

As it happens, none of us slept very well on Tuesday night. Amelie was kept awake by a persistent cough, I was worrying about the potential cost implications of pet adoption, and Lisa was busy panicking that we're living through the final segment of Cat's Eye, and are all about to die.

By 8:30am, the three of us had been sitting on the bed for an hour, stroking the new cat, while Amelie jabbered on relentlessly about how much she likes it, how cute it is, and that if we can't find its owners, she'll look after it herself. Before adding that if it's a boy cat, she wants it to have kittens with Chloe. At which point Lisa turned to me and said "It feels like Christmas morning". I said "What, because it's all so magical and exciting?". She said "No, because we've been up for hours, no one's had any sleep, and we all feel like death warmed up."

At 9am I phoned the vet, told them our story, and asked if they can scan the cat for a microchip. The lady on the phone checked their database of missing cats, found none that matched the description, and told me to bring it in for scanning. Half an hour later, Amelie and I were at the surgery, watching as a veterinary nurse waved some kind of computerised probe over our stripy friend. She did it three times, just to be sure, but there was no microchip present. She did, however, say she was "pretty sure" the cat's female. And probably less than a year old. I didn't ask for a more qualified opinion for fear of being charged, but the girl seemed to know what she was talking about.

I returned to the receptionist to complete the 'Found Cat Report', which included a description of her appearance and location, plus my contact details in case the owner comes forward, but to my surprise, both members of staff seemed to think I should keep her. Experience has taught them that a caring owner will usually ring around the local vets within a day or two of the cat going missing, and this one had been gone for at least 48 hours - probably twice that. She's not been chipped, doesn't have a collar, and the owner's not reported her missing. As the receptionist put it, "She's so lovely, they don't deserve to get her back".

So we drove home with Amelie in the back seat of the car, asking if the cat belongs to us now. I told her yes - for the time being. So she insisted on choosing a name. Within a minute, she'd plumped for Shamona. Which is something only Michael Jackson has ever said. I think she picked it up from Bo' Selecta! It could have been worse though. With her track record in the naming department, we could have had another Hellodadada on our hands.

To be honest, Lisa and I aren't that keen, but Amelie's so insistent (despite being unable to tell us where she heard it), that we've finally admitted defeat and are going along with it. We are, however, changing the spelling to Shimona. Mainly so that we can shorten it to Shimmy.


No doubt she'll lead us a merry dance...

'The Artist' might have left us dumbstruck, but fortunately there's nothing that can't be fixed by some high calorie food. So having suffered in silence for ninety minutes, we went straight from the cinema to Prezzo on Monday afternoon for a slap-up meal. It being date-day, I wanted to spare no expense and treat Lisa to her favourite Italian food. And besides, I'd spent my Tesco Clubcard points on vouchers, so it cost me virtually nothing.

Whilst at the restaurant, I revealed to Lisa that unbeknownst to her, I had plans for the rest of the evening, and that we'd actually be going on somewhere else afterwards. She was naturally quite excited, and sure enough, within the hour, we were parking up next to a Porsche 911 with the numberplate '18 AR'...


It was in the Lidl car park. Times are clearly harder than I realised.

Having walked out of Lidl with some kitchen rolls and a bag of sweets, it soon became obvious to Lisa that date-day was drawing to a close, so I drove her home to do the ironing. Which is where our week took an unexpected turn. When we arrived home at 5:30pm on Monday, we were met outside our block of flats by a little cat who came running up to us, desperate for attention, and started jumping up to meet our hands, rather than waiting to be stroked.

We spent a couple of minutes making a fuss of it, then came inside, narrowly avoiding being followed in by the cat, who then pressed its face up against the glass of the door in a calculated attempt to tug at our heart strings. We watched it from the window for a while, and it seemed to be going up to every passer-by, begging for attention and asking to come in. We knew it was unlikely to belong to our block, as we have no ground floor flats, but we assumed it had an owner, and thought no more of it.

So that was Monday. On Tuesday, Amelie was back, so I told her about the cat, and suggested she keep a look out for it, whilst not really expecting to see it again. So I picked her up from nursery at 5pm yesterday and walked her home, where lo-and-behold, the same thing happened again. We were greeted by the same cat, with the same behaviour. I couldn't drag Amelie away. We were out there for twenty-five minutes. She even asked to put her gloves on because her hands were so cold, but she still wouldn't leave the cat and come in.

Whilst doing some industrial stroking, one of our neighbours came by and said that the cat has been around for a few days, and is sleeping under the portacabins which have become a permanent fixture on the estate. I was tempted to take it in there and then, but caution prevailed, and Amelie and I eventually made it through the door without our cat shadow.

Lisa was out at the time with a friend, but at 7pm, I looked out of the window, and saw the cat sitting forlornly on a breeze block outside one of the portacabins. I considered going down, but Amelie was just on her way to bed, and I could see myself getting caught up in some kind of McCanns/Tapas situation. So I stayed where I was. Until Lisa got home and virtually demanded that we adopt it.

When the poor little thing was still out there at 9pm, I gave in...


That was ten minutes after arrival. Talk about making yourself at home.

I'm writing this at 7am, and Amelie's not up yet, but she's going to think it's Christmas when she does. We don't know whether it's male or female, lost or abandoned, pregnant or diseased, but this cat is the friendliest creature I've ever encountered. I feel like I'm being stalked by Top Cat. The thing won't leave me alone. I'm trying to type this with a laptop on my knees and a cat on my chest. If it doesn't maintain physical contact at all times, it's not happy. I can't even go to the toilet alone. In fact it's hard to take photos, because the moment I stand back more than two feet, I'm immediately followed.


Chloe's a little wary, but we've had no fights, and as for Amelie, she'll probably faint with excitement, but we'll be warning her not to get carried away. Which is more than can be said for the cat when Am sees it. We've checked the latest mug-shots on Lost Cats Brighton, and it's not on there, but I'll be taking it to the vet today to have it scanned for a microchip. With a bit of luck, it might be identified. But if not... well, we haven't decided yet...

Twenty minutes into 'The Artist' yesterday afternoon, Lisa turned to me in the cinema and said "Are you enjoying this?"

I lied through my teeth and said "Yes."

To which she looked incredulous and said "Really?"

Suffice it to say that Richard Roeper and I are no longer friends.

I don't know what it is about the films that Lisa and I choose to see together, but I don't think we've both loved a movie since 'Juno'. And that came out four years ago. Admittedly we only get to the cinema about twice a year, but even so, it means we've sat through at least eight turkeys.

The Artist was beautifully made, well acted and very innovative, but it just wasn't our cup of tea. With hindsight, that should have been obvious. We both like films with sparkling dialogue and a witty script, so one with just eleven spoken words (twelve if you count 'woof') was never likely to win us over. But when everyone who sees it says it's great, and it's named as best film at the Oscars, Baftas and Golden Globes, we felt we had to give it a go. Unfortunately I can only conclude that the six thousand industry professionals who make up The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences don't know as much about films as I do.

I'm not saying it was a bad movie, but it bored me in the same way that The Bolshoi Ballet would bore me with a performance of Swan Lake. I like language and wordplay, not art and expression. There were also practical problems. At one point, George Valentin picks up a note from his wife, which prompted Lisa to lean across and ask me what it said. As I whispered back into her ear, "The film's got no words, and you can't read the handwriting. We really do have problems".

There were bits that I liked though. Jean Dujardin's moustache was excellent, and the intertitle which read 'BANG!' was very cleverly placed. I also liked the way that Lisa completely failed to get the ending of the film, when George speaks his only two words of dialogue, and had to have it explained to her over the closing credits. But other than that, it was disappointing. Next time I'll be insisting we see a film with both colour and sound.

Right. After two days of ceaseless hard work, the cooking, cleaning, washing and shopping are all done, and I'm seriously testing the theory that housework never killed anyone. But on the plus side, the carpets are so clean, it would be a pleasure to collapse on them. In addition, we're doing our bit for medical science by finding out if the development of an unborn baby can be improved by regular doses of Ben & Jerry's Vermonster ice cream and microwaved Frankfurters. Lisa thinks yes.

In the meantime, Amelie's made a new friend in St Leonards...


That's the friend on the left. The bloke on the right (who appears to be wearing Amelie's dog hat) is the one who put her in a summer dress in late February. We've all been there. I went through most of last winter without knowing where Amelie's vests were.

But wardrobe malfunctions aside, it's important to make the most of any child-free opportunities life throws at you, so having spent some quality time with a bottle of Flash and a hoover, I've decided to get up close and personal with my wife. With Amelie due back in 24 hours, Lisa and I have decided to extend date-night to the whole day.

Needless to say, when you've spent the weekend doing housework, what you really need is a nice sit down and a bit of peace and quiet. So we're going to the cinema to watch a silent film.

Personally I refuse to see anything that hasn't won five Oscars the night before, so we're off to see 'The Artist'. I want to find out which of these two is the better actor.

Admittedly it's taken a certain amount of persuasion. As Lisa said to me this morning, "I don't even like black & white films with sound, never mind ones without", and with the exception of 'Clerks', I'm pretty much with her on that one. But as the American film critic Richard Roeper said, "Yes, it's virtually silent, it's black-and-white, and you might not know the leads. But if you don't take a chance on this film, we can't be friends any more". And I'd hate us to fall out.

When the Leveson Inquiry used the phrase 'hounded by the press', I think this is what they had in mind...


That's Amelie on her way out in her dog hat and pink sunglasses, carrying an 'I Love Chocolate' bag from Thorntons. And she really didn't want her photo taken. It's not easy being a paparazzo. I almost had a Liam Gallagher situation on my hands.

Anyhoo, back on January 1st, I wrote that "I'm already looking forward to my next week off at the end of February. I think we'll be choosing St Leonards for that holiday too", which as predictions go, has proved to be only partially accurate. My parents' house might be the perfect winter getaway, but in the end we decided it would be far more relaxing if Amelie went on her own. So we've packed her off to my Mum's for a couple of nights.

She has a habit of taking her Peppa Pig umbrella to nursery on the brightest of sunny days, so typically she looked out of the window at the grey clouds and drizzle, and decided to wear dark glasses. The dog hat was apparently "to keep the sun off my head". And to prove to the world that she's barking.

In the meantime, Lisa and I are living it up by sleeping, shopping, hoovering, sorting, dusting, washing, cleaning, tidying and wondering where we're going to fit a Moses basket. Lisa's taken the first of those jobs, and I'm handling the rest. By the time I go back to work, I'm going to need a holiday.

One of the advantages of feeling queasy is that you tend to walk about with your eyes on the ground, looking for a convenient gutter. And that means you spot things you might otherwise have missed. As luck would have it, I did make it into work yesterday (woo-hoo), but I still felt a bit fragile, so I completed the five-minute walk through Kemptown and past St George's church with my head bowed in reverence, in the hope of giving the vomit a shorter distance to travel.

I was just out of sight of the Sussex Eye Hospital, and walking along Sudeley Street with my eyes down, when I saw a vision of green on the ground. I'm no stranger to rescuing things from the gutter (it's how I found Lisa), so I picked it up, and discovered this...


It's a green folded card with the words YORK HAS BEEN WLA'D printed on the front. For a moment, I thought Fergie had joined the Women's Land Army.

More intriguing still, is that the inside of the card features a hand-written list of addresses...


Naturally I wanted to know what the WLA is, and what they've done to the residents of Eaton Place (which is where Patsy Palmer lives), Chesham Place (home of the Seven Veils pole-dancing school), Chichester Place (where our friend Nora used to live) and Chesham Road (where nothing interesting ever happens), so I went home and looked them up on the internet. Ten minutes later, I'd visited the World Lottery Association, West London Alliance, Worral Lees Associates, Wimbledon Language Academy and Westcountry Landlords Association, and frankly I was none the wiser.

Personally I think it's a hit list from the World's Leading Assassins. But having wiped out the occupants of 24 Eaton Place at 9:55 in the morning, they encountered some fierce resistance a few doors down, and met a sticky end at number 17. Clearly the card got tossed into the gutter in the crossfire. I always knew Patsy Palmer could handle herself.

I'm not saying I don't want Chloe to feel better, but she's now perked up so much she's ruining our lives. For a start, she's now eating such a lot that I had to make a mercy dash to the vets after work this afternoon just to buy her some more food. And that meant being forced to deal with a receptionist so rude I could have punched her in the face. But in addition to putting me through that ordeal, Chloe's managed to spoil Lisa's entire evening.

She (by which I mean Lisa, not Chloe) had programmed the TV to record a vitally important show this afternoon. She wanted to watch 'The Real Housewives of Orange County', which is pretty much the classiest show on ITV2. Personally I thought the only 'Orange County' was Essex, but this is about an entirely different set of bronzed women. It's essentially a public information film designed to show Lisa what life could be like if I had a better job.

Unfortunately we came home to find Chloe asleep on the TV remote control, having pressed a button to bring up the help menu. Lisa's recorded an hour of information on how to upgrade your cable services. Which would never have happened if we had a maid.

Mind you, Lisa's used to missing out. She had a midwife appointment yesterday, at which she was hoping to hear the new baby's heartbeat, but she was forced to cancel at the last moment due to a high risk of vomiting. Naturally I wanted to make it up to her, so once Amelie was asleep this evening, I pinned Lisa to the bed, spread jelly all over her, and dug out our old foetal doppler to record this astonishingly bad, lo-fi bit of distortion...


It's not so much a heartbeat as a panic attack.

Blood-spewing episodes aside, there's been a lot of sickness in the Gardner household over the past couple of days. Chloe spent most of Tuesday and Wednesday throwing up all over the carpet, and by yesterday I was fearful that Amelie's days of lying on the sofa, watching Cbeebies and sucking her thumb with a cat under her arm, could be coming to an end.


But oddly, Chloe seems to have perked up a bit today. Which is more than can be said for the rest of us. I spent yesterday doing a clinic in Haywards Heath while the reception staff went down with the lurgi one by one. By lunchtime they'd all gone home sick.

Despite the lack of face masks, I made it through the day apparently unscathed, only to arrive in the office this morning and have a conversation at the water cooler with one of my colleagues about how rough she felt. Half an hour later, she'd gone home too.

It was soon afterwards that I started feeling queasy myself. At the time I put it down as some kind of psychosomatic reaction, but having felt mildly nauseous all morning, I popped home at lunchtime to get some sympathy escort Amelie to nursery, only to find that Lisa had been throwing up all day. She assumed it was pregnancy, I thought I was suffering from paranoia, but in reality we might both be ill.

Lisa certainly wasn't feeling herself. I told her at lunchtime that I'd booked a couple of weeks annual leave for August, and she replied, in complete seriousness, "Is that for the Jubilee?". I had to remind her that we're having a baby.

So Lisa took to her bed this afternoon, while I took Amelie to nursery and returned to work. I still don't feel too great, so tomorrow's rota has been changed to make sure I'm not far from a sick bucket. Amelie appears to be fine (I watched her plummeting down the nursery slide from the window of our department), but she told me afterwards that her best friend Mandy "had a sad face all day". I asked her why, and she said "I don't know, I didn't ask her", which shows what a caring little friend she is, before adding "Maybe her Mummy told her she couldn't have any ice cream".

She then asked if we could go to the shops. I think that's what they call emotional blackmail.

I don't know if it's the creeping progression of the nanny state or just the continual erosion of an individual's right to privacy, but it comes to something when a grown man can't bleed profusely on his own bathroom floor without attracting attention from his mother.

Within twenty minutes of publishing yesterday's blog post, my Mum had texted me to ask why I was coughing up blood over Sunday lunch. It's a fair question, I suppose, and one I'd intended to answer, but I'd already written 2,000 words at work yesterday (the minutes of that meeting were more like hours), so frankly I couldn't be bothered.

As it happens, it goes back to the night of 18th February 2004, when I had an unforgettable deep throat experience at a club on the outskirts of Dallas. I didn't mention it in my blog post the next day, but whilst having dinner by the stage of the Addison Improv, I managed to choke on a French Fry. To cut a throat story short, a razor sharp piece of potato got lodged in my gullet, and grazed a bit of soft tissue as it went down. I ended up gagging in the comedy club. Which was no laughing matter.

Ever since, I've been vulnerable to attacks by hard carbohydrates, and if I don't chew my chips thoroughly, I end up cutting my own throat. Which was what happened on Sunday. I swallowed a pointy piece of pizza, and before I knew it, I'd sliced open my oesophagus. In a very minor way.

To be honest, I would have been fine, but I excused myself anyway and went to the bathroom, just in case I started heaving at the dinner table. I was soon joined there by Amelie, who needed help wiping her nether regions, and as I bent down to assist her, I felt something catch the back of my throat. As I stood up, I gave an involuntary cough, and to my surprise, blood spurted out of my mouth and all over the floor. It was like The Exorcist, only more horrifying.

Physically, I'd just scratched the inside of my throat and felt fine, but mentally it was something of a shock to see Amelie standing on a plastic stool in the middle of the bathroom, surrounded by her own father's blood. So we both stood in stunned silence for a moment. Until Lisa arrived, saw the blood on the floor, and almost fainted.

Fortunately, the situation was saved by Amelie, who took in the murder scene around her, looked at her Daddy, and shouted "You've got red on your face!!", before bursting into laughter. At which point I mopped up the pool of blood on the floor, changed my t-shirt, and rejoined Marie for banoffee pie. As Sundays go, I've had worse.

Since Friday of last week (which, coincidentally, is when she last saw her cousins), Amelie has been delighting us with a new and definitive fifth verse to the song 'The Big Ship Sails on the Ally Ally Oh'. It's a thoughtful and poignant piece of songwriting, which we're currently hearing about six times a day, and it goes like this (sing along if you can):

We all dip our bums in the deep blue sea,
The deep blue sea, the deep blue sea,
We all dip our bums in the deep blue sea,
Whoops, bang, whee.

In reality of course, it's not quite as simple as that. It can take the persuasive powers of three adults to coax her into the water...


That's Amelie explaining to a trio of swimming instructors that she's more of a poolside sun-lounger than a dolphin. It's ironic, because at home you can't get her out of the bath for love nor money. I've offered her both.

Fortunately, however, the girl in the yellow had a stick...


Whoops, bang, whee. Or in Amelie's case, wee. I'm sure the deep blue sea was a different colour at the end.

Anyhoo, yesterday was quite a momentous day around these parts. Not only did our good friend Marie come down to visit us from Croydon, but we took Amelie for her first ever swimming lesson. Lisa made the discovery a few weeks ago that the local pool is a training centre for swimming instructors, and that if you allow these trainees to practice on your offspring, they only charge you £3 for ninety minutes. It's the cheapest childcare in Brighton. And Amelie gets a wash.

We weren't quite sure what to expect, but as it transpired, it was brilliant. They had a total of seven children and thirteen trainee instructors, meaning that Amelie had the undivided attention of at least two people at all times for ninety minutes. And it cost us three quid. I could have hugged them all at the end.

On the downside, you weren't allowed to take photos...


No, really, you weren't...


... but fortunately I didn't see that sign until they spotted me in the public gallery and pointed it out to me.

The no-photography rule is obviously designed to deter paedophiles, which is also why they have a no-touching rule for the instructors. Which was a shame, because Marie quite fancied one of them. I can see the sense of it, of course, but at one point a well-meaning instructor attempted to persuade Amelie to jump into the pool with him by getting her to hold the other end of a rolled-up laminated piece of paper, simply because he was too scared to offer her his hand. Lisa was tempted to go straight down there and tell him he can do what he likes with our daughter. Frankly, for three quid, we don't care.

Despite a slow start, Amelie was remarkably good. Especially as we spent the entire ninety minutes upstairs behind a pane of glass, chatting to Marie. Admittedly, our daughter gave the impression that she might be more suited to floating around on a li-lo than doing fifty lengths, but she quickly grew in confidence, and seemed quite happy in the care of the instructors. A total of five had a go with her in the end, and all appeared to be excellent. It can't be easy working with someone who just bobs about in the waves with her feet in the air. So within hours of getting home, Lisa had booked her in for more sessions. We'll have her doing the breast stroke by Christmas.

As for Marie, it was a pleasure to see her as always. She's off to Sweden next month to witness the aurora borealis, so the bright lights of Brighton don't hold much excitement for her these days. Fortunately Amelie injected a bit of sparkle into her visit by showing her a few levels of Supercow, after which we fed her copious amounts of pizza, pasta and banoffee pie, pausing only for Amelie to have a poo while I coughed up blood all over the bathroom floor. That was a meal to remember.

The biggest news to reach us from swinging London, however, is that our mutual friend James, who is not only a world expert on micropenises, but is also the author of eleven blog posts, and someone with whom I once played Mike Read's Pop Quiz, is getting married in the summer. I haven't seen him for six years, so I asked Marie to pass on my congratulations. She said "You can do it yourself. He still reads your blog."

So congratulations, James. Where's our invitation?

I think this is possibly the best photo Lisa's ever taken of me...

She's found a way to distract onlookers from my permanently pink eyes by making me look like a serial killer. It just goes to show that you don't have to go out on a Saturday night to have fun as a couple.

But before anyone thinks I've taken up cage-fighting at the weekend, I should point out that the small, comfortable device which is being worn discreetly in my mouth, and is almost invisible to the naked eye (assuming you're Stevie Wonder), isn't a boxer's gum shield, it's a self-fitting anti-snoring appliance. It works by stopping you getting any sleep.

As it happens, I'm not the one with the problem. I'm the one with fifty quid to waste on a hulking piece of plastic that not even Carly Simon could fit in her mouth. I don't know if it's down to pregnancy, teeth-related accidents, or just an urge to annoy me, but Lisa's been working on her night-time impression of a motorbike for some time now. My main worry is that she's going to develop serious spinal bruising from me poking her in the back twenty times a night, but I'm also concerned about my own sanity, and the possibility of me violently smothering her with a pillow at 3am, just so I can get some sleep. Which is something I'd probably live to regret.

So I bought her a Therasnore for Christmas. It's "a soft, small appliance that is so simple and easy to fit" and prevents the lower teeth and jaw from falling back during sleep, thereby stopping you snoring. The makers say it's "probably the most comfortable solution for Loud Snoring and mild to moderate Sleep Apnoea available today". Which makes you wonder what the others are like.

Anyhoo, I'm not saying it isn't "simple and easy to fit", but it's taken us two months to understand the instructions and set aside an evening to do it. Every time we get it out of the box, I take one look at the manual and decide it's easier to sleep in the other room. But last night, we finally got around to it.

Apparently the fitting "takes just a few minutes", so I think our clock must be wrong, and involves a saucepan of boiling water, a bathroom mirror, and a very real chance of Lisa gagging uncontrollably and bringing up her dinner. By the time we'd finished, everything became clear, and it was obvious how the thing works. It basically stops you breathing in any meaningful way, and prevents you ever sleeping again. Except possibly with the angels. You might as well stuff your mouth with a pair of socks, and then point your spouse in the direction of your will. The Therasnore website states that "after just a few nights of wearing it you will hardly notice it at all". Mainly because you'll be dead.

Anyway, I'm sure the makers of Therasnore have many satisfied customers, and the device has saved thousands of marriages, but frankly it's not for us. Lisa eventually stopped heaving long enough to tell me that she felt like a pig with an apple in her mouth. Although obviously she couldn't say that until she'd taken it out.

Fortunately, Therasnore comes with a 30 day money-back guarantee to cover the unlikely eventuality that you have a human-sized mouth and can't get it in there without dislocating your jaw. Sadly I bought it two months ago. But as Lisa said to me last night, as she reached for the camera and insisted I try it myself, "you'll get a blog post out of this".