The Battle of The Sniffly Nose.

Mark and I have colds. Actually let me re-phrase that: I have a cold and Mark has MAN FLU.
So it goes without saying that he is dying upwards while I am more than capable of getting on with my day. However he looked so pathetic that my mum thought it essential to come and take the baby off our hands, thus leaving me free to look after my patient.

Last night we nearly came to blows. Now I don’t know what bed is like in your house, but in mine, most night’s it is hell. I started off kind of cosy: because I couldn’t breathe while flat on my back, I propped myself up with additional pillows, into which I had slipped eucalyptus scented hankies. I did the same for Mark and in the early stages of the night our bedroom was a scene of marital bliss, complete with sniffy noses.

I read for a bit. Mark grumbled about the light hurting his eys. I read a bit more. Mark got kind of crazy. So I switched the light off and burrowed, snug as a bug, under the blankets.

Bad idea Miss May. Very bad idea.

You see the thing about me and Mark is this: nowhere is the fact that we are not meant for each other more evident than in the fact that I like to sleep with the quilt over my head and one foot basking in the cool air. And Mark does not. Mark sleeps with the covers wrapped around his feet and everything from his chest upwards completely bare to the elements. Readers we were doomed from the start.

But eventually we drifted off into semi-unconsciousness. Until Mark started to snore like a motorbike. So I gently persuaded him to turn onto his side. Which he did. dragging the covers with him, and leaving me almost as naked as the day I was born. So I tugged and I tugged and he sat up and said "It’s Liverpool and Man.U in the morning" and I said "Fabulous" and pulled the covers over my head as he got out of bed altogether and asked if we had any ginger biscuits…

So I gently persuaded him back into bed, wrapped myself up and tried to sleep. And oh, but I tried and tried, but once you are awake, you are awake. So I listened to him snuffling and blew my nose on his behalf. And worried about whether the TV license was due. And dwelled on whether the nursery was good for Finley and wondered where my necklace with the green stone had gone and then I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew, Mark was jumping around the bedroom telling me he couldn’t live like this anymore, and was there any need to take all the blankets and between this and  that God Damn pink washing up bowl, he just couldn’t cope. Then he half choked to death.  And I laughed uncontrollably and then the baby woke up and  wanted to watch Noddy,  and Mark lost the plot altogether and took his quilt downstairs, and then ten minutes later  arrived back with water for me and milk for the baby and all was  scrumptiously calm again.

So this morning we are tired. Mark doesn’t remember a thing. We are dosed up to the eyeballs with Goodness Knows what and Mark is much much sicker than me.

Well he must be mustn’t he? He’s off to watch the football now, while I’m too shivery to go out the door…