AAARGH

I am in a right strop. This morning it was bad. Now it's worse.

We pick up Dig from the airport and he airily says that he's not going anywhere for a little while now, so we can all be nice to each other at home. He suggests because it is late in the day we could stop at the pizza shop in the square and get pizza. Although I am grumpy about this because I am broke and Dig is just coming back from a trip which hasn't paid anything, I can still see some advantage to not cooking Tesco value pasta again at 8.30pm.

Then it all goes downhill. With speed. Dig says next month he goes over to Brazil for a not holiday. That sends me quietly seething. If he adds anything else right now about that I might have to give into the urge to drive the car onto the hard shoulder and have a loud scream. Before I can even get to that point, Shark goes bonkers and starts slapping Tiger. Tiger punches back and Shark screams. Squirrel gets involved with Shark flailing about next to her and starts kicking wildly anything in kicking distance.

Shark is screaming, Tiger is howling, Squirrel is kicking, Dig is shouting and we are getting close to Toddington, where I had to pull in here last week and have a breakdown. This is getting too regular for my liking. Soon a CCTV image of a disfunctional family disgorging from the car weeping and brawling will be on a reality programme about the life of a service station. Week after week, it'll be the Grit family at Toddington.

In the middle of all the screaming, Dig shouts out the punishment for us all. 'No pizza!' Right. So I'm cooking Tesco value pasta again at 8.30 tonight.

Or I'm driving the car onto the hard shoulder, having a big scream, then driving back to slam down a cereal packet and bottle of milk on the kitchen table before leaving home.