Insults and Paranoia - A Little Something For The Weekend

Supermarket surgery this morning, and it's as bad as usual. Constituents who have nothing whatsoever to complain about - which is why they don't actually contact the office during the week - spot The Boss sitting under his banner in Tesco's foyer, while they're buying their weekly groceries.

Then they frantically rack their brains to dredge up any minor irritation to talk to him about, purely to be seen by their neighbours in the company of an MP, however unkempt and hungover said MP may look.

So today we have uneven pavements; puddles at the end of driveways; overgrown hedges, and litter. Each complaint will require me to write a letter to whichever is the most-relevant agency, and to send a copy to the constituent - together with a covering letter saying how nice it was to meet them. When we eventually receive replies from the County or City Councils, they'll be sent out with another personalised covering letter.

With the weather we've been having, there are four hazardous puddle complaints alone! Then there are all the beer-toting, polyester-clad, World Cup-crazed constituents who just want their photographs taken with The Boss, who insisted on wearing an England shirt this morning. There has to be more to life than this.

Taking me home at lunchtime, The Boss drives even more erratically than usual.

"Are you still drunk?" I ask.

"No," he says. "I have a lot on my mind."

I somehow doubt that, but I know a cue when I hear one.

"What's the matter, Andrew?" I try to sound as if I give a damn and, as usual, it works.

"Do you think I'm too trusting?" he asks.

"Um,  I don't know. Where is this going?"

"I think those shits in the local Party are out to get me again. I was set up at GC* last night." Andrew's eyes are looking like Mr Beales'. Here we go again.

"Set up how?" I say.

"Bastards wanted me to confirm that, now we're finally in opposition, I can - at last - be relied upon to toe the Party line. Outrageous. I think I may have to take steps to deal with them. I'm sure that swine Peter Carew is angling to steal my seat."

I don't quite know what to say to this. The Boss has recurrent bouts of paranoia anyway - like all the politicians I've ever met - but he doesn't usually look and sound quite so unsettled. I can't actually think of anyone in the Party - Pete Carew included - who'd have either the energy or the desire to usurp him, but then I don't share Andrew's longstanding belief that they'd all stab him in the back as soon as look at him.

"I don't want you or Greg talking to anyone from the Party from now on, Molly," he says. "Not even the staff - you can't trust any of 'em."

"But they're in the next office -"

He glares at me, and almost crashes into a woman with a pushchair, who's standing at a Zebra crossing. I decide it's safer to shut up, and live to enjoy what's left of the weekend. I'll deal with this latest lunacy on Monday.

In the evening, Max and I have dinner with Susie and David, to celebrate David's company having just been sold. For three million pounds. To give him his due, David does resist the temptation to remind me that I warned him he'd never make a penny if he set up a courier company, on the basis that the market was already saturated; but he does say,

" Molly, you are the biggest waste of potential I have ever known."

Honestly, David is supposed to be my best friend. Max says afterwards that I should have asked what David meant. I say I don't want to know.


*GC: General Committee, regular meeting of local Labour Party big-hitters, to whom The Boss has to present his GC report, explaining what he's been up to at Westminster. Usually drafted on a napkin from the buffet car during Andrew's journey home on Thursday evenings, and then given to me to decipher, completely re-write to remove all references to jollies, and then pass to Party staff to print and disseminate at the start of the meeting.

Calendar Girls

Monday morning, oh joy. God knows why the public think working for an MP is glamorous.

When I arrive at work, I'm greeted by the sight of an hideous new office-calendar bearing the logo: Andrew Sinclair MP: Working Hard for Hardworking People. It features The Boss grinning inanely in front of a block of flats in Easemount.

You can't see the other block which got burnt out just before Christmas by our regular nutter, Steve Ellington, on the basis that, if he was going to have a miserable festive season, then so were all his neighbours.

Greg has Photo-shopped the picture to show a bevy of obese, naked women standing behind The Boss. They are also grinning inanely, and improve the photo no end. At least Andrew's gone back to the House today so I won't have to cope with him in the flesh. There's quite enough of that on the calendar.

Greg won't discuss what he got up to at the weekend, just says he's planning our next move. Our next move? It doesn't bear thinking about.


The first letter I open sets the tone for the day:

Dear Mr Sinclair,

I am writing to you because there is a serious problem on Broad Street. I walk down there every day to my job at Economyland, (a girl needs her pin-money, after all), and what should I see at the side of the road today but a dead rat! This is bad enough, but what I want to know, Mr Sinclair, is what would happen if, when I was walking past one day, the rat were to be struck by a car, be hurled up in the air, and then strike me in the face? Something needs to be done before this happens.

Thanks for all you do for hardworking people.

Yours etc
Pauline Harpenden (Miss)

Greg thinks it's funny. I despair - what the hell am I supposed to reply to that?

There are only three women in the Coalition Cabinet so far - apart from a Lord - and I bet they're only there to act as nursemaids to the men, who are probably all just like The Boss. He phones this afternoon to ask whether we need him for anything. We never do but, as usual, I pretend there's something I need his advice on.

Then he asks, "Am I for or against cycle helmets?"

Honestly, no wonder the country's in such a mess when MPs can't even remember where they stand on the simplest issue. Mind you, I bet the Tories and LibDems have no idea where they're supposed to stand on anything now, given all the horse-trading that's gone in over the last few days.

They're probably even more stressed than The Boss, who sounds a bit frazzled. I ask him what's the matter, though I don't really care since he blamed me for upsetting Mr Dougan.

"I'm thinking we may need to do something to tighten up security," he says.

"Oh good," I say. "Any particular reason?"

"Someone put dog shit through my letterbox on Saturday night."

"Oh, vital we do something about that, then," I say. I don't tell Greg - he'd be far too triumphant.

In the evening, the house feels funny without Connie, who went back to university this morning. I am left in testosterone hell, which I think must be contagious. I look closely in the mirror for the first time in days, and see hairs sprouting from my chin. God - now, I'm turning into the bearded lady.

I start plucking them out, but seem to grow another two for every one I remove, and I can't even see the damn things properly, despite the 25x magnifying mirror. I suppose I'll be able to work as a circus freak when Max notices them and leaves me.

Since Ellen's comments at my birthday party, he's taken to doing sit-ups every night - much to Josh's amusement. I think it'll take more than sit-ups, but wisely say nothing, as I am endeavouring to become an enigma.

Just before I go to bed, Mum phones to announce her latest affliction - something to do with a painful buttock. She certainly gives me one. I endure an hour of whingeing and then instruct Josh to shoot me if I ever become like my mother. He just raises an eyebrow meaningfully and returns to the important business of doing nothing.