Louise Rennison - Are these my basoomas I see before me?

False beards are over. I will never wear the beard again.

Ditto horns. And finally…

4. I will not do arm-wrestling or any kind of wrestling with Dave the Laugh.

Dave the Laugh is no longer a laugh to me. He is Emma’s boyfriend and my mate.

Actually, I wonder where he is? I haven’t seen him for yonks. Ah, well. Stop thinking about Dave the Laugh. He is not in this re-entrancing document.

Five minutes laterBlimey, I have finished my manifesto and it is still not time to go home. Miss Wilson is humming and reading something. It had better not be some humming idea she has for the school play. I am not doing a humming version of Rom and Jule and that is a fact. I am not humming in tights.

Four minutes laterI know what I will do next. I will make another scale for the Ace Gang. On how they too can become great mates like what I am.

Ten minutes laterGreat mates scale.

1 Offer a mate a Midget Gem without being asked.

2 2. Share your last Jammy Dodger even though you really want it and your mate may be flicking her fringe about.

3 Listen to your mate rambling on about themselves when you have got vair important things to do yourself (e.g. nails, plucking etc.).

4 Be with your mate through thick and thin. Or even if they are both thick and thin. Tee-hee. I made a great mate-type joke there. Did you see??? Which leads me to Number 5.

5 Always be game for a laugh even though you may be blubbing on the inside.Crikey, I am coming out of this scale VAIR well indeed. But as everyone knows, I do not blow my own trumpet. I just blow my own HOOOOORN.No, I don’t. And that brings me to my tip-toppy of the toppimost great mate scale.

6 Even when they have all the reason in the universe to be top dog (i.e. when they are the girlfriend of a Luuurve God, even if it is slightly on a sale-or-return basis) a top mate does not blow their own trumpet. Or snitch on her less fortunate mates.

6:00 p.m.On my way home at last. Miss Wilson said, “Well, now that’s over, I expect you are excited about our workshop for Romeo and Juliet.”

Oh no, the humming in tights.

Miss Wilson was rambling on.

“I’ve been busy coming up with some original ideas. I think it’s important to keep up with you modern girls. I hope we can make this a…erm…groovy production.”

Oh dear God.

I was walking along as fast as I could out of the school gates. She is wearing a knitted hat. It has a bobble on it.

That is all I am saying. I am not being bobble-ist.

She turned left out of the gate with me. Please, please let her not be going my way. I had done my detention!!!

She was still going on.

What if she linked arms with me?????

“I know you girls might think that us teachers are not very, you know…hip.”

What? She was trying to be my mate! Please don’t let her tell me about her growing feelings for Herr Kamyer. Maybe she’ll call him by his first name. I don’t even know what that is. I don’t want to know. I bet it’s Rudi!!!! Stop being my friend!! I’ve got enough on my plate without having to be friends with knitted people.

She didn’t hear my inner screaming though. She said, “Yes, I think you will see that I do listen to your ideas and so on. For instance, when Jas suggested that perhaps Juliet could have a little companion-a sort of puppet dog-I thought ‘Bingo’!!”

I couldn’t stop myself, even though I had taken a vow of silence until she shut up or I died. I said, “Er, Miss Wilson, do you remember your last ‘Bingo’ idea? Do you remember, you said that juggling would be ‘happening’, but what actually ‘happened’ was that Melanie toppled over with the weight of her own basoomas and the oranges bounced into the audience.”

Miss Wilson said, “Well, that’s the excitement of theatre, isn’t it? The danger, the risk!”

“Yes, my grandvati said an orange nearly took his eye out, so…”

Miss Wilson fortunately saw a bus coming and scampered off to get it. Thank the Lord.

It really is tragic how keen she is to get on with us. Touching really, if you like that sort of thing. Which I don’t.

Thank goodness no one I knew saw me walking along talking to a teacher. I may just as well have gone to a leper colony if they had. Or become a policewoman.

Twenty minutes laterMy road at last. Angus was round in Naomi’s garden. He likes to go over to Mr and Mrs Across the Road for his evening poo.

Mr and Mrs Across the Road are vair unreasonable about it. They say he always chooses to poo in their rare heathers windowbox. I explained to them, that is because the soil is nice and softy and he doesn’t have to do any digging. But you can’t tell people.

When he last came over to complain, Mr Across the Road said, “How long does his breed of cat live? Is it nearly over?”

I said with great dignitosity (I like to think), “Angus is half Scottish wildcat and sometimes he hears the call of the wild and longs to poo somewhere that reminds him of home. Hence the heather.”

Mr Across the Road stomped off though. Some people don’t understand the poetry of life. Or even the poo-etry of life. Hahahaha. I have just made an inward joke.

One minute laterWhen Angus saw me, he did his weird croaky miaow thing. And waved his tail about. His tail is still a bit crooked from his car accident. (The accident being that the car wasn’t the huge mouse on wheels that Angus thought it was.) Otherwise, he is top dog catwise.

He came bounding over, purring around my legs. Which is nice, but it makes it really difficult to walk without falling over and breaking your neck. Now he has started his pouncey game. He pretends my ankles are his prey and hides behind something until my ankles loom in view. Then he tries to kill them.

I managed to beat him off with my rucky.

Then I noticed that Oscar, Junior Blunder Boy and all-round idiot, was lurking around on his wall, pretending to talk on his phone to all his mates. A.k.a. the Blunder Boys. He was going, “Yeah, check it…for real…awwwrite.”

Absolute bloody wubbish of the first water.

I’d be amazed if he can work his phone and keep his trousers up at the same time. I used to prefer him when he just played keepie-uppie for ages. Now he’s taking an interest in me, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

When he stopped pretending to talk on his phone, he shouted over to me. “Ay, girl! Do you believe in love at first sight…or am I going to have to walk by again?”

Then he flicked his fingers and said, “For real.”

Good Lord.

I didn’t say anything.

What is there to say?

Besides “Go away” a LOT.

As I walked in my gate, Naomi came slinking along, waggling her bottom about. She displays no glaciosity or sophisticosity. Things are very different in the cat world. If I was a pussycat, entrancing a Luuurve God, I would merely have to lie on my back and display my girlie parts to him. Or maybe lick my bum-oley area, and not only him, but every boy in the area would be following me around like fools.

Angus and Naomi slunk off together under Dad’s useless clown car. Vati has got a fur driving-wheel cover now. There is absolutely no need for it. Mind you, there is no need for Dad either.

Front roomOne minute later Vati was in his recreational area, a.k.a. lying on the couch getting fatter.

He lurched into life when I tried to slope up the stairs.

He said, “Where have you been until now?”

I said, “Why? Have you been waiting to tell me how much you appreciate me as a daughter and that although you will never be seeing me again once I am twenty-one, you have liked me entertaining you through your twilight years?”