I had an interview today. Don’t get excited – it was with a recruitment agency. However, the woman who interviewed me was so confident that she could get me a job inside thirty days, she bet me a drink on it.

On it’s own, that sounds like a sociable enough offer – but it was the hottest day in weeks, and the humidity was unbearable, and the air conditioning in the offices had failed, so all the staff were sweltering in the heat and unfastening buttons and fanning some air around their embarrassingly visible wonderbras. Half a dozen female staff, covered with a fine sheen of sweat, just getting unbearably hot…

I was trying to fill in forms, for pity’s sake! “Experience” refers to previous jobs! I can remember my DfES reference number! I know I can! Oh no! The woman with the skirt on is using a fan to cool her legs! What’s my National Insurance number again?

First, a quick tip for everyone who has been criticised by their parents for feeding junk-food to their children: they aren’t fish fingers. They are witvisfilet, by Royal Appointment to Queen Margrethe II of Denmark. We bought them from a specialist importer in a small town in Yorkshire (well, a cash & carry in Leeds…)

Anyway, I have (for the second time) inherited Darling Wifey’s old computer.

This time, however, it is not a clapped-out, third-hand component-built laptop in a flimsy case, but a two-year-old Dell. Solid, sturdy and (once the spyware was deleted) nice and reliable. In the meantime, she has a shiny new laptop through her job and she has been transferring all of her files onto it. The last job I had was to clean up the Dell of spyware, viruses and assorted other programmes (Darling Wifey likes to log on to the Internet and enter the command download *.*) and put my files onto it.

Easier said than done when your wireless network card has been subjected to an Autistic Inquisition.

Anyway, after a busy day in which I also fitted two new tyres to the Mini, took the dog to the vet to be spayed, bought a new fridge, turned down a very generous offer by a recruitment agency to return to my old school and take up my old job again, (“I assume that you have a good reason for turning this job offer down?“) and left my engagement ring at a local jeweller’s to be mended (I drove over it) I can now settle down and get some work done.

The state of emergency was declared when I was still on the ‘phone: parents and sister were clambering into the Mercedes with the intention of blessing us with a Visitation.

All Hands On Deck! General Quarters!

We broke out the mops and vacuum cleaner. Tiny Flirt was allocated Toy Tidy-Up Duty and despatched to the sitting room with a large toy box. He did us proud.

Little Madam was courageous above and beyond the call of duty as she performed the Laundry Roster. Mount Skidmark didn’t stand a chance.

Little Nutter shouted, “Oh no!” and ran off to his room. ‘Sensible boy,‘ I thought. I admit now that I was complacent and negligent. Hindsight always has 20/20 vision.

Five minutes before ETA a neighbour knocked on the door and politely, embarrassedly, delivered the message no-one wants to hear. She could see it from the street.

It had been smeared everywhere. Not just on the window and in the curtains, but also in his hair, bedding and the new Hornby railway. Thankfully his clothes were still clean, but then he was naked.

How we did it, I’ll never be able to tell you. But when the parentals arrived at the door there was only the dim and distant tang of Domestos to welcome them. And I have never, ever deserved a drink quite as much.

Little Nutter’s respite is turning into a blessing that every last one of us enjoys.

He loves it because he gets to spend every other weekend being as Autistic as he likes without it upsetting anyone else. He can sit in windows, stark naked, watching the trains rattle across a level crossing all day and not get disturbed by any irritating sociable people.

Little Madam and Tiny Flirt love it because it means they can watch films at a couple of dozen frames per second. (What a ridiculous speed! How can you possibly memorise every pixel at that speed?)

Darling Wifey & I love respite because it means we can relax. She can shut herself in the front room and pretend to write fiction while she’s really gossiping with her friends on Instant Messenger. And, of course, I have to take him there and back – a total of 90 miles of country lanes in the Cooper…

This afternoon I collected him from a very happy weekend of locomography (we had entertained friends, drank too much and, for reasons I can explain but not understand, eaten raw brocolli for breakfast. It is Little Madam’s favourite food.)

The routine stopped on the way home, though, when we popped into a local shop for some butter (breadmaking) and Little Nutter took control. “Hello!” he said to the staff. “Cereal?” he asked. Without a word, the staff pointed to the back of the shop.

I snatched the butter as he dragged me past the fridge.

He dropped a large box of cereal into a basket and dragged me to the counter. (“Help!”) I tried to grab a bottle of wine (“No! Norby boy!”) Newspaper? Forget it!

The boy is a wonder. He took control.

Happy, happy, happy.

If railway magazines are Autistic porn (and Little Nutter has a photo of three big diesels and a little electric that must surely break four or five sections of the Obscene Publications Act 1959 & 1964) then what does that make Hornby Railways? The Autistic equivalent to latex dolls?

Darling Wifey & I were feeling rather guilty about his toys. He still plays with the same train set that we bought him shortly after we discovered that he had Autism, three years ago. (Three years? Holy Obsessions, Batman! That’s a lot of wine!) We were watching him this morning, setting up this rather battered and pathetic little wooden train set, several pieces chewed by the dog, and still loving it. It just wasn’t fair – Little Madam and Tiny Flirt have much nicer toys, and Little Nutter hasn’t actually destroyed anything since before Christmas.

So we took him out shopping and bought him a Hornby Steam Starter Set.

He wasn’t impressed with being taken out of the house and insisted on bringing a box of tatty, broken trains with him into Argos. When he was there, and he discovered that he couldn’t steal the catalogue with the pictures of the trains in them, he went nuts and screamed and kicked and wailed and cried.

Eventually we arrived at the collection counter, battered and bruised, and suddenly he went silent. He could see a great big box covered with pictures of trains. He could hardly lift it off the ground, but there was no way he was going to let anyone else touch it. He cuddled it in the car all the way home.

At home, he loved the track and squeaked happily at the details on the engine and was in his usual “train” raptures – right up until it was all finally set up and I turned it on.

There isn’t a name for what happened next. But I wish there was. He was rampant.

He has also been incredibly gentle and sensible with it. He can connect the track and link the carriages with remarkable delicacy, and loves nothing more than watching it go round very slowly, saying, “Round and round and round and round…” as it goes.

Happy boy.

Darling Wifey is sick of my complaints – I think she has a point.

We’ll start from the ground and head up – always sensible. So we have the verruca scar, dating back to my university days, and which is now a wad of hard skin the size and density of a marble.

My shins and thighs are fine – in fact, very shapely and muscular. I wear shorts for a very good reason, appreciated by all the ladies I meet in public. My knees, however, are knobbly and, not to put to fine a point on it, f***ed by too much running.

Moving up towards my pert and curvaceous regions we come to the sciatica, caused by the best car I ever owned. I was a full six inches too tall to fit in it and, even now, ten years later, I’m paying the price. However, as with all good cars, it sent the blood flowing straight to the parts that nice girls never reach. I have no complaints.

I would skirt round my spine, but since I want to avoid it a straight line would be more appropriate.

Blood pressure. Hmmm. Variable, I think, but it has a tendency towards the giraffe rather than the sloth. Let’s just say that it’s reached the point where another cup of coffee doesn’t make a scrap of difference. I’ll have a red-eye, please.

That leaves the migraines, myopia and ears…

The front room is now complete. Well, apart from the ceiling needing painting. And a bit of skirting board needs mending. Oh, and one of the new floorboards hasn’t been varnished.

My new motto: never finish all your DIY jobs, because then she has no further need of you.

Anyway, Darling Wifey marked a few hundred exam papers this summer, and last week got paid. She was going to buy three or four new pieces of furniture for the front room. But instead, she found one. A bespoke oak bureau. Made for the Lord of the Manor in some place out in the Fens, to match the two leather-topped desks in his office. But now the manor is up for sale – so there it was on Ebay with a rather low “Buy-it-now” price. It was exactly the sort of thing that gets bids of up to a grand, but had a quick sale price of less than half that.

So Darling Wifey spent her entire wad on it.

It looks fantastic. She worked hard for it and earned it.

Little Madam saved her pennies like only a little girl can. She saved a few pounds as well – they arrived in birthday cards yesterday, and she stacked them all neatly. And she took them with her when we strolled into York this afternoon.

And, in a shop, she found exactly what she was looking for. And she recited her prepared speech.

She would pay for it all herself; and it would be something the whole family would love; and you put fresh fruit in it, so it would be good for us all.

She bought an ice-cream making machine with her birthday money and her savings.

She had even budgeted for a trip to the market to buy the fruit!

She was heartbroken when we got it home and she discovered that the mixing bowl needs to be frozen for 18 hours before you can start making ice-cream – but we start tomorrow at 1pm sharp!

Words just cannot begin to express…

Well, they all came back this afternoon, and not too badly damaged.

Little Madam and Tiny Flirt were at Grandma’s, during which time they ate Cardboard McBigs five times. That’s more than they get in three months with us. As these two short people are more used to getting steamed veg and absolutely nothing deep fried at home, I am tempted to give them a spoonful of cod liver oil and a diet of thin gruel until their little guts recover.

They have also forgotten a few basic manners: the telly is now turned on without permission; “please” and “thankyou” has been replaced with “give me!” and the offer of fresh fruit for pudding was greeted with howls of outrage – why can’t they have chocolate cake?

All in all, I think that Grandma’s evil plot to make our lives hell by spoiling our children rotten has achieved results beyond her wildest expectations. They have come home hyperactive, energetic and deliriously happy. It’s wonderful – and I predict we’ll be suffering weeks of “I wish I was still at Grandma’s…”

Meanwhile, Little Nutter was in Autistic Heaven. Life in respite is dictated by the train timetable at the nearby level crossing. Not only do passenger trains pass through, but the line also services several power stations nearby, so there is an endless stream of very very long and very very slow coal trucks.

When I arrived to collect him, he didn’t even turn his head to acknowledge me – but very carefully stood up (with his eyes still glued to his railway magazine) and sat on my knee. The Autistic equivalent of jumping up & down and screaming while wetting himself.

Finally, tonight, they all followed me as I pushed our hand mower round the lawn. They were collecting all the grass cuttings and putting them in a huge pile at the bottom of the slide. Then they all piled down the slide together and noisily crashed into the cuttings.

Life has returned to the noisy, chaotic norm.

Apparently I’m out of step with the modern world, and need a Mission Statement. With a Mission Statement, I can Achieve! Be Successful! Live a Fulfilling Life! Do Purposeful Things!

So here goes!

In my life I seek out the inner urging to pursue excellence and quality of existence. It is my desire to get out of bed every morning inspired to believe, achieve and excel. Motivational thinking is the key to creative, enthusiastic and stimulated existence. My incentive is success and self worth. My catalysts are energy, drive and positive thinking. My actions are my greatest possessions. My values are synergetic and elemental. My achievements are worthy badges of honour.

Yes, I know, I’m mocking. But I have every right to be cynical. It is exactly this sort of vacuous bullshit that prevents hard-working people from actually getting anything done these days.