Super time since Stanley was banished! Now it’s just us: me, Dilyn, Dom, between episodes, and darling Bozzie, though what with my campaigning and his commitments we hardly meet! Last night I woke up aching to discuss marine conservation matters to find this note on his pillow: SORRY OTTIE WARGAMING NEIL IN UNDERGROUND BUNKER, BACK C3 DAYS, YR B. I said but Dom, this is your handwriting, where is Bozzie, really?
Dom (looming out of the darkness): “What if I said, hiding from Andrew Neil?”
Me: “Liar, my Bozzie is brave and strong!”
Tried Bozzie later, whoever answered sounded weirdly Chinese. Called Stanley, he said the great unwashed often sound foreign, especially up north.
Me: “But Stanley I need your help, where is Bozzie, I have something so special to tell him.”
Stanley: “Oh gawd, or lor, already, not THAT dear girl, please – do not think me unsympathetic to the stirrings kindled by a mature alpha Johnson, dear me no – but I believe my son the PM is not, shall we say, undeserving of the discreeter sort of outcome.”
Me: “Stanley! I just want Bozzie to be the first to hear that Dilyn has learned to do his business on Lib Dem doorsteps, so cute!”
Stanley: “And Labour ones? That is what my son the PM – not that I am familiar with his location – will want to know.”
Me: “Actually – ”
Stanley: “Well, if you would get a rescue dog, no don’t cry, now this will make you laugh, did I ever tell you about our Dartmoor neighbours – accidentally reared a Labour dog – but it’s a long story, why don’t I tootle over?”
Me (screaming): “Stanley, wait – I do have something to tell you.”
Silence.
Me: “I can’t spell Pinokkio.”
Result.
As told to Catherine Bennett