Seven weeks in

One of the main rules about writing, so I'm told, is that you should always know your audience. I think when people say this they mean that you must have an awareness of the people who are ultimately going to read your words. How do they think? What techniques should you be using to get your point across? What are they going to feel or do as a result?

Nowhere is there any advice about what you should do when your wife is one of the audience members, and you really want to write about the godawful state she got in last night.

Bugger it. I'm always in trouble, it's just the depth that varies.

Regular readers of this blog will know that my saintly wife Katie does, on the very odd occasion, enjoy a drink. Or two. It would be a massive overstatement to say that she's a lush. Especially as she will read this tomorrow.

Last night we went to see Mike and Emma after their return from honeymoon in Malaysia. A great night was had by all; Malaysia looks wonderful from the photos, the happy couple had a good time, and Katie "drank well rather than wisely", as my dad would say.

Some people get violent when they drink, and insist on telling you you're their best mate. Often in a headlock. Not Katie.

Some people get maudlin when they're drunk. They're the people to be found on the stairs, weeping bitterly whilst singing the words to "Send in the clowns" over a bottle of Bombay Sapphire. Not Katie.

No, Katie is what's known as a repetitive drunk. Her memory span goes west and she forgets that the tale she's carefully recounting to the room is in fact the same one she told us not five minutes hence. No bother, she'll stop when you point this out to her. And five minutes later, that story about the CD she bought last month will, like an old friend, be making its reappearance. It's very entertaining, especially for a woman who, when sobre, has a mind like a steel trap and doesn't forget a single thing.

She also had some spatial-awareness issues, too. Let me explain. We live in an enclosed street; there are houses on three sides where we are, so taxis generally drop us off and then turn round to get back out. Last night, however, the driver turned around first. No biggie, except when Katie extracted herself from the back of the minicab, the view she got wasn't what she expected. "Where's our house?" she exclaimed out loud. Rather too loud, it must be said for the time of morning. However, there was a genuine level of panic in her voice that only lessened when I employed the tactic of turning her around 180 degrees to see the house in which we've lived since 1996.

Never a dull moment. I wouldn't have it any other way, either, dear.

Anyway, what's all this high living doing to the numbers?

Another two pounds off from last week. So far I've lost 16 pounds with another 12 to go before the end of September. And I'm begining to notice a difference, too. Belts are going in a notch, trousers are getting that bit more loose. I have a horrible feeling that clothes shopping might be in order at some point. That's a grim experience for me at the best of times.