Wet behind the ears... number the ninth...

After the mother-in-law recently ratcheted up the pressure on Angelika, my bride and I to start a family, Angelika has forced the issue even further by becoming decidedly broody. My argument that another mouth to feed on a Parliamentary Secretary's salary would be difficult fails to convince her. She says: "Babies and politicians are supposed to be totally compatible. You're always seeing politicians kissing babies." Yes dear, but only when an election is near. Let's talk again in four years' time.

Monday

My minister (for obfuscation) dispatches me to address the media on a topic of national importance. We, the government, have decided to expropriate some land down south, belonging to an ex-opposition prime minister. We plan to build a six-lane highway which will pass directly through his front garden. The opposition media is outraged and one fellow even has the cheek to suggest we are doing it out of spite. Absolutely not, I tell them. This government is far too mature to resort to spite.

Tuesday

Marthese, my secretary, is retiring, so I must start interviewing her successor. Frankly I am less interested in their personal assistant skills and more interested in their physical size. A heavily overweight female would never fit into my 'office' under the stairs... which eliminates two thirds of the applicants at a stroke.

Wednesday

Today I am instructed by the PM to enrol in a one-day seminar at the university on the art of speech making.

Among the other participants are the Parliamentary Secretary for Opening Old Wounds and the PS for Finding Something Nice To Say About Austin. But I don't see the PS for Rubbishing The Opposition, the PS for Papering Over The Cracks or even the PS for Keeping The Unions Sweet. Could their absence be explained by assuming that the PM deems them not to be in need of speech-making tuition... or, as I prefer to believe, because they are all so beyond the pale that they are not worth bothering with?

Thursday

I see myself as a pretty manly sort of chap and I never baulk at stuff like visiting the dentist. I work on the premise that if I don't actually see my own blood being spilled, I'm fine. Today is different; I am among a small select group of young, healthy parliamentarians obliged to turn up at the blood bank - with media cameras in tow - to give blood and set an example to the public to do likewise.

All goes well until, inadvertently glancing down to see my own blood running through a tube into a bottle, I... what the hell am I doing in a ward at Mater Dei?

Friday

After being discharged from hospital this morning, I arrive home to be greeted by Angelika and her mother. The kunjata is concerned - not for my health, naturally, but lest my brief stay in hospital has jeopardised her chances of becoming a grandmother before the year is out.

And I'm not exactly reassured by overhearing her tell Angelika: "You wouldn't listen to me. You defied me and went and married this one, when you could have had David Bonavia Harvey.

Instead he married Rachel Fsadni Borg only a few weeks before you got married.

And David's already given her one... with another on the way.

I wouldn't be surprised to hear that the one you married turns out to be gay." What?

Saturday

I normally enjoy going to friends for a dinner party. This evening, though, I have strong misgivings. It's at the home of Graziella and Mark Axisa Verona. Mark is a successful architect and Graziella is a great friend of Angelika's. Graziella has just produced a son and heir, so Angelika's broodiness is given an extra boost as she coos over the kid in its cradle thing.

Driving home, I try to put a damper on her enthusiasm for the kid by saying: We saw it all cleaned up; we didn't experience the nappy business and all that regurgitated food business. But Angelika swoons on: "Oh that wouldn't be a problem. The nanny would see to all that." A nanny! On a Parliamentary Secretary's salary! You - have - got - to - be - joking!