Why Erect Is Not Always A Good Thing.

Let's just say I am not having an Edith Piaf moment. I could not regret this haircut more.

I nearly have a heart attack when I spot myself in the mirror this morning.

"Holy shit," I say to Max. "What the hell happened to my hair in the night? Was I actually swirling around?"

"It's just sticking up a bit," he says.

Given the lack of gold stars, I don't know how he considers himself an expert on such matters, but I refrain from mentioning that. Instead, I start trying to resurrect my hairstyle, which takes a lot longer than you'd think.

"Brilliant," I say. "Now I'm going to have to go through all this every bloody morning."

"It does look much better short, though," says Max.

As far as I'm concerned, this is right up there with "You have a great body for your age" in terms of being a backhanded compliment. Why didn't Max tell me my longer hair looked terrible at the time?

My ostentatious sulking seems to have no effect whatsoever on anyone, though - probably because there's no-one at home to witness it. Josh and Max decide to go into town, while I go back to bed in an effort to stop the room moving.

When they arrive back home - after what appears to have been a diversion to the pub - I decide to risk returning to an upright position, and am rewarded with both good and bad news. The bad news is that lying down has made my hair stick up again, but the good news is that Dad has sent me another email.

There are more photographs attached but, yet again, there's no text to give me a clue as to the contents, so I call Josh and order him to open the files. You can't be too careful, after all.

As I put my hands over my eyes, just in case of a sudden vertigo-inducing attack of naked Thai brides or man-boobs, Josh starts double-clicking.

"Here we go," he says.

We both stare at the screen in disbelief.

"Fish," I say.

"Yes, indeed, Mother," says Josh. "Nothing gets past you."

"Very funny. But fishing? For fish?"

It's hardly a common hobby for a man with a short attention span, is it? But at least Dad's got a new interest. Maybe he'll decide to come back home now, and the Porn-Poon saga will be over. Stepmother Mark IV averted.

"Yes!" I say, and punch the air. Josh raises his eyebrows.

"Yes, what?" he says. "Since when do you like fishing?"

"I don't," I say. "But this means Dinah's right: Dad must be bored."

"He's probably just passing the time 'til he can get score some more Viagra," says Josh. "I wouldn't get your hopes up."

After yesterday's triumph of reality over optimism, this is probably good advice, but it has given me an idea: I wonder how Max would react to Viagra? You could probably extract it from my hair. That's definitely got a problem with frequent erections.