“I guess that’s what love really is,” I ponder.

Ice forms on the telephone wire.

“So,” replies the LTLP in the calm voice that she uses to kill the ants, “getting up at two ay em to come and comfort you because you’re sitting on the toilet crying; getting up at five ay em because the Toddler is wide awake and won’t go back to sleep; taking the morning off work to take the Toddler to nursery because you’re still too pissed to drive. That is what love really is?”

Under the surface I detect a small undercurrent that implies that I am in the Dogghouse. It is not a place that I have ever found particularly comfortable. I try to think of something to say.

“I guess that it would be tactful not to go to the Village Pub tonight?” I come up with.

There is a long pause. I am not sure whether it has yet ended.

This economising is getting me down.

We are totally broke. “I’ve tried to cut out absolutely everything but the bare, bare essentials,” I explain to Short Tony in the Village Pub. “But it’s just not working.”

One problem is the unexpected things that happen each day. Example: I decided that I would make a nourishing risotto with all the manky things left in the fridge that would otherwise be thrown away. I created a stock from an old chicken carcass (net saving: one stock cube) and we had a delicious yet economical dinner. Unfortunately, at the same time, the LTLP managed to leave the cordless phone outside in a rain storm.

Daily saving: 1 stock cube – price of 1 new telephone = (insert negative amount in here).

I picked it up from the lawn. There is a convention in cartoons whereby if somebody falls into a river, they emerge onto the bank, take their shoes off and pour a gallon of water out. They then pluck a fish from their ear. The telephone was a bit like that. I tried to look on the bright side; our phone bill will be less next month. I did not shout at her much in case she suggested that I got a proper job.

Short Tony is sympathetic. His garden renovation plans have turned into a government IT project and I suspect that we are in the same boat, viz the third-class compartment of the one heading towards the iceberg carrying a cargo of live angry sharks and some industrial magnesium.

We have a short and hopeless conversation about where all the money went, before ordering another pint.

I watch the Cricket Tournament.

Grudgingly, I admit that the new Ronald McDonald version of the game is very exciting. But mainly I am excited because I am sticking it to the man!!! Evil Rupert Murdoch has not noticed that it is being shown for free on the muslim Sky Channel 815 so you don’t need to pay him a penny!!!

Each day I watch the first game at 9am. Then I have a bit of a break before watching the second. By the time the third match is on, I am not just sticking it to the Man but I am pulling moonies at him and making fun of his cock.

They are the Sky pictures, but the commentary is in Urdu (I think), which makes it even more exciting. Admittedly the coverage is still branded all over the place with the station’s Evil Corporate Sponsor, but I do quite like Chicken Cottage although there are not many of them near the Village.

I sit in happiness in front of the TV. Imran Nazir from Pakistan misses his shot and gets hit in the knackers. I do not wish Imran Nazir any ill-will at all, but any cricketer will tell you that seeing somebody get hit in the knackers provides a huge internal conflict of horror and schoolboy joy. That is not just me being immature. I am not immature and anybody who says so is a poobum.

They show him being hit in the knackers in slow motion, then they show him being hit in the knackers from three or four other camera positions. I feel a bit sorry for the fielders. They know that they are on TV and have to remain poker-faced. ‘Hawkeye’ then demonstrates the path of the ball from the bowler’s hand into the batsman’s knackers. Imran Nazir decides to retire hurt and let another batsman have a go.

We cut to a commercial break. There are more images of fried chicken. I make myself a cup of tea.

“Have you not seen them?!?” I enquire innocently.

Eddie follows my glance across to the saloon bar. His jaw drops, like Mr Bojangles’s dog. Beside him, Len the Fish looks up from his pint in astonishment.

“Bloody hell…” gasps Eddie.

“Quite – striking, I thought,” I say.

A couple of the other regulars notice and join in. The Well-Spoken Barman pushes past us to get to the gap in the bar. He has the leave-me-alone air of a man who has been defending haberdashery all day. We tactfully wait until he is serving other customers before resuming our discussion.

“There’s re-upholstery. And there’s re-upholstery.”

The glow from the fluorescent pink now seems to fill the room, transfixing and hypnotising all who behold it.

“It’s like… it’s like we’re in a Gay Bar…”

“No,” I correct him. “It’s like we’re in a heterosexual notion of what a gay bar might look like.”

They nod at my sage wisdom.

“Actually, most of the gay bars that I have ever been in have been horrible dives.”

“What we should do is get one of the barstools covered in that material. Then we can play forfeit games as to who has to sit on it.”

“Did you see the UFO the other day?”

“No. But I’m sure there are aliens out there somewhere,” insists Eddie. “Somewhere.”

The chairs are forgotten. We talk about extra-terrestrials for some time.

I pot the straight pink.

My opponent graciously shakes my hand; his team mates point and jeer and roll around laughing at the somewhat unexpected result. I do what I have been dying to do for the entire frame – I rush for the toilet like a charging werbeniuk.

Throwing open the door to the main part of the club I am greeted by a startling sight.

We are being raided by the police!!!

Two policewomen stand in the hallway. I screech to a halt in shock. There is a short pause whilst I work out what to say.

“Hullo,” I decide upon. “I didn’t see you come in?”

“No,” replies one of the uniformed ladies. “We sneaked in through the back entrance.”

I am one of those people who only ever thinks of funny things to say after the event. Witty rejoinders just aren’t my thing. Unfortunately, my brain picks this time, this one time, to start experimenting with this particular talent. I wish it wouldn’t do things like this.

“Ah. I’m always trying that but my other half isn’t having any of it.”

There is a long and rather pointed silence, like I’ve just been introduced to the Lubbocks at a dinner party and absent-mindedly greeted them with a cheery ‘Awright!’

“Is the owner in, please?”

“Let me show you round the offices.”

I am thrown by this. I have psyched myself up like a hungry tiger, albeit a hungry tiger that is resigned to having to put together a short pitch and credentials demonstration in order to be awarded some freshly-dead gazelle. But my psyching-peak has arrived too soon!!! I have to look at some offices first.

Things have gone a bit pear-shaped on the money front recently, according to the LTLP who looks after those sorts of things. This has entailed some economising. She arrived home yesterday with some supermarket own-brand Weetabix, and if that is not Hogarthian degradation then I don’t know what is. Therefore I have made the reluctant decision that I should try to get a bit more work, ie some work.

I have not been into the capital city for a while. The last time, I had to go to Goodge Street, the BBC3 of underground stations, then on to Camden Town which put me off somewhat as it is full of the most awful people that there can possibly be, viz people who think that they have a sense of humour and have set up a business creating t-shirts with witty slogans. There is no justice when the good people of Basra are being exploded to death whereas the people who create ‘Adidhash’ t-shirts are left to ply their trade unmolested. But there is no oil in Camden Town eh, George?

I am shown an office. I always used to show people the offices when I had an office to show people (my private secret office in the garden shed does not count). It seemed like the polite thing to do. I had no idea that it was so intimidating an act. I examine the office, carefully.

“It’s very nice,” I comment.

My host whisks me through to another office. “Here is another office,” she announces. “And here are some people!”

I give a weak wave to the people, who are almost exclusively foxy-looking girls, although it does not seem appropriate to mention this at the time just in case it is some kind of honey trap arranged by the LTLP with all the money I thought we had. There is an everso short pause.

“Hullo,” I say, brightly.

We stand in the office, with the people. I look round, trying to think of what else to add. There are some shelves on the wall. They are good shelves, all level and not bowing in the middle. I wonder whether I should compliment them on their shelves but I decide against it. They would not have put the shelves up themselves. Their hands are too dainty.

Just as I am wondering whether to pipe up a conversation about photocopying, we move on to the next room. “And here,” I am told very proudly, “is my desk. Where I sit.”

It is a smashing desk, and there is indeed a chair planted underneath it, which backs up her story.

“Right – shall we get on then?” asks my host. I realise that my tigerness has all but dissipated. It is a trick of an Evil Corporation to do this; I have forgotten all the things that I meant to say and all my initial suave and go-getting impact has been lost.

I emerge later, with no gazelle.