Louise Rennison - ‘Luuurve is a many trousered thing…’

It is a nice day. The birds are humming and the bees a-singing and I can see Angus the furry Luuurve Machine lolling around in the morning sun with Naomi. They are very much in love if the amount of bum-oley licking is anything to go by.

I must consult with a book of wisdomosity.

This double boyfriend fandango is not mentioned in Mutti’s book How to Make Any Twit Fall in Love with You .

Maybe Robbie and Masimo will have to have fisticuffs at dawn to decide who gets me. Who knows what the right etiquette is in this scenario?

One thing is for sure. I will not be asking Dave the Laugh, my Horn Adviser and occasional snoggee, to the fight. He will only think it is a laugh and start shouting out stuff like, “Hit him with your handbag, Masimo!” or “Mind the hair, love!” Anyway, Dave is too busy to give me advice these days. He will be with his “girlfriend”. I wonder what number they have got up to on the snogging scale?

Shut up, brain! I don’t want to think about Dave – he is an ex-snoggee. And just a mate. I have enough to worry about without Dave popping up all the time (oo-er).

This does mean that I am going to have to be on high beauty and glamorosity alert at all times. One of my multi boyfriends may be so driven by snognosity that he rushes round here first thing in the morning. I must be prepared. But no one must know. I must exude glamour but in a natural just-tumbled-out-of-bed way.

Soooo just a hint of foundation, touch of bronzer, lippy, mascara and tiny bit of eyeliner. Which I like to think looks like I have a touch of the Egyptian in my genes.

That is what I like to think.

Now what to wear? Nightwear or daywear?

What would you wear if you had unexpectedly woken up to the doorbell ringing and you didn’t know who it was but you suspected it might be a Luuurve or a Sex God?

Not Teletubbies pyjamas, that is le fact.

Denim skirt and a T-shirt?

Yep.

I took a peek out of the front window. No sign of any Sex or Luuurve Gods. The reverse, in fact, because I was alarmed to see Mr Across the Road in his garden in a shortie dressing gown. I hope he is not going to become a homosexualist in his twilight years. Then Mrs Across the Road came out in a massive pair of pyjamas. Was there the suggestion of a small moustache on her upper lip? Maybe that’s what happens in the end when people are married: they change sex. My dad is certainly on the turn, but on the other hand no man alive has developed nunga-nungas like Mum.

Why hasn’t Jas phoned?

You would think that Radio Jas would have been on the airwaves of life wanting to know what happened to me, and also wanting to report what had happened after I left the gig. I suppose I will just have to wait until she wakes up, or the rest of the Ace Gang wakes up to let me know what is going on. I must use the steely discipline for which I am world renowned.

That’s it, I can’t stand it any more.

Crept out of the house. I won’t leave a note because no one will notice I am missing for hours. The last thing I want is a cross-examination from Herr Vati. Or Mum being “interested”.

Angus is still lying on his back on the wall while Naomi licks his face, and now she has started on his bum-oley. How disgusting. Kittyporn first thing in the morning.

Also, they are both covered in what looks like snot.

Oh, Blimey O’Reilly’s trousers, it isn’t snot; it’s frogspawn. They have been marauding about in Mr and Mrs Next Door’s new marine conservation area – known to other normal people as a bucket with disgusting tadpoles and slime in it. The Prat brothers, also known as Mr Next Door’s annoying and useless toy poodles, were on marine conservation lifeguard duty. So all Angus had to do was duff them up a bit, round them up into their kennel, and then it was a night of splashing around in the bucket to his heart’s content.

The Next Doors will go absolutely ballistic; they always do about the least thing. Mr Next Door has been hovering on the edge of a nervy spaz for the last year and this might drive him over the edge and into the rest home. His shorts will probably explode with the tension. Which is no bad thing, unless I happen to be around at the time and am exposed to the sight of his huge bottom looming about.

I said to Angus, “You are soooo bad, Angus, and in for big trub. That is a fact. Au revoir , dead kitty pal.”

I’m sure he understands every word I say because he got idly to his feet, stretched, and nudged Naomi off the wall. He treats his girls rough.

Naomi leaped back on the wall and arched her back and raised her hackles, making that really mad screechy noise that Burmese cats do. She was spitting at Angus and teetering backwards and forwards. Really, really mad.

Angus was frightened. Not. When she got near enough he biffed her with his paw and she disappeared over the wall again. You had to laugh.

Not for long, though, because after he had rolled about on the lawn to get rid of the frogspawn he began stalking me.

Oh no, not today, my furry friend. I am not having him tagging along with me all day causing mayhem and eating anything that moves. I said, “Clear off, Angus, stay there. Sit. Sit.”

I even threw him a stick to distract him and he ran bounding off after it, but then came back to trail along behind me.

I started running.

He started running.

I hid behind a wall.

His head loomed over the wall at me.

In the end, to give him the hint, I threw stones at him – some of them quite big.

This is hopeless. He doesn’t care about having stones thrown at him at all. He is senselessly brave.

He is trying to catch the stones in his mouth.

He’s just slightly dazed himself by heading one of them.

No sign of Jas being up and her curtains are drawn. Damny damn damn. She is so lazy, snoozing in Pantsland. I don’t want to arouse any interest in the elderly mad by ringing the bell. Even though Jas’s M and D are on the whole more acceptable than most, in that they provide snacks and Jas’s dad doesn’t speak, they are still technically in the elderly-loon category.

How can I get Jas to get up without ringing the doorbell?

Oh, here we are! There is a ladder in the shed. I can use my initiative and Girl Guide training (which I haven’t got and never will have) and use the ladder to make a small fire to send smoke signals past her bedroom window. Shut up, brain.

It must be a child’s ladder as it only reaches to just above the lounge window. I would have to have orang-utan arms on stilts to reach Jas’s window. Poo and merde .

As I was looking up wondering how to make my arms grow, something bit my ankle really viciously. Angus was on the ladder with me, looking at me and playfully biting my legs. Ouch, bloody ouch.