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Surprisingly not really hungover this morning, though maybe a little bit tired. And though I had intended t crack on with some work, I decided to bunk off with my family instead. It’s one of the great things about being self-employed. The downside is that when you’re self-employed you don’t get paid. Because your boss is aware that you’re not really unwell. Also he is bunking off you and it’s really hard to have proper fun when that square is hanging around. You know what it’s like.
But I preferred the idea of going to soft play with my wife and daughter than writing jokes. And so off we went. Phoebe much prefers Catie to me - I mean, I don’t get that - sure she lived inside her for 9 months, but I am really, really funny - and today even got annoyed if it was me, rather than her mum, pushing the pram. We had our first proper argument about this which consisted of her saying “No” and me saying “Yes” in increasingly loud voices. I suspect there will be other, more eloquent heated discussions to come. But come on girl, your mum was still right there and I was only touching the pram, not even you. You’ll admit that I was in the right about this when you read this back (and by then will surely have realised that I am way the best out of your mum and dad anyway).
It was only a temporary falling out. I managed to distract Phoebe by getting her to remember going to football yesterday and telling her mum about how great she was. This mainly involved her miming kicking a ball or counting on her fingers, but I know the way to make a baby happy is to stoke their ego, so all those years working with Stewart Lee were not entirely wasted.
And Phoebe forgot that she was annoyed with me by the time we were at soft play. There was a double slide in amongst all the other apparatus and I managed to squeeze my way up the little ladder and we came down in tandem. It was one of the highlights of my life and definitely better than working. I never got to play on this kind of thing when I was a kid and I don’t want to go on about this,but it hurts, I didn’t even go on a bouncy castle until I was in my 20s. I very much like the fact that having a child means you get the chance to play again without looking (too) weird. The other day when walking down the street alone I thought it was a shame that you never see adults skipping along and wondered at what age it becomes unacceptable. I was tempted to do it just to see what people would do, but the conventions of society weighed down upon me.
My wife got in the small ball pit with Phoebe who got buried a couple of times, but seemed to enjoy it. I wanted to jump in too but thought that all the balls might fly out like in some kind of 21st Century version of the Archimedes experiment.
Phoebe also spent a fair amount of time on a toy motorbike. Further proof that she is mine.
We had an early dinner and did a bit of shopping and came up with a game where we pretended to be upset if Phoebe put her legs outside the seat of her pushchair. Working sucks my friends. Don’t do it. Just spend time with your family all the time. I mean you will soon starve to death, but those last few weeks will be magical.
The RHLSTP with Deborah Frances-White is now up in the usual places. It’s another cracker, I think.
