MANGOLD PARVA, LEICESTER
A SUNDAY IN APRIL, 2011A fitful night's sleep. Had anxiety dream that Kate Middleton married Ed Miliband and Prince William married Justine. I was in charge of the arrangements so crowds of baying royalists hounded me out of England into the protective arms of Colonel Gaddafi.
I woke not to the sweet sound of birdsong or my pig grunting outside my window, but to the deeply upsetting sound of my parents shouting and swearing. I put on my ex-wife's dressing gown (from which I'd removed most of the bows and ribbons) and hurried to their half of the pig sty conversion.
My parents never lock their doors, believing fervently that if they leave Radio 4 on all day at high volume it will be enough to deter burglars, who will flee in their getaway car if they hear You and Yours, Desert Island Discs or The Archers.
I pushed the front door open and found my parents on the floor in their nightclothes and my father's wheelchair upside down with the wheels still spinning. It looked like the first scene of a Midsomer Murders mystery.
"Your mother wants me dead," said my father.
My mother yelled: "All I said was…"
Dear diary, how often have those four little words preceded disaster or divorce:
1. Walt Disney's wife: "All I said was, the mouse's ears are too big."
2. Eva Braun: "All I said was, shall we go to Belgium this year?"
3. Architect's wife: "All I said was, won't that bridge wobble?"
After I'd put my father back into his wheelchair, he lit one of his filthy cigarettes and whined: "Your mother's booked me into Dignitas, son. She's just told me I've got to go to Switzerland. I know I'm a burden but I'm not ready to die. I've not reached my potential yet."
My mother lit a cigarette (neither of my parents can talk without one) and said: "He's a senile old fool."
She gave him the TV remote and pushed him into the living room. My mother said in one of her loud whispers: "The Wheelchair Salsa Society have arranged an Avoid the Royal Wedding trip to Zurich and I've put our names down. Why does your father always think I want him dead?"
I glanced around the kitchen: there was a broken electric plug with a frayed cable at wheelchair height by the door and a huge tub of paracetamol next to the kettle which I put out of my father's reach.
My mother asked me what I was doing on the royal wedding bank holiday. I told her about the Prostate Survivors Group trip to walk the Victorian sewers that run under Leicester city centre. They are meant to be one of the wonders of the East Midlands and are only open for one day a year for bona fide citizens of Leicester.
I said to my mother: "When I'm in the sewer I may take the opportunity to ask our tour guide about my water bill, which is incomprehensible to me. Do I owe them or do they owe me?"
MONDAY
Picked Gracie up from school. She told me she was excited. I asked her how excited she was.
She told me: "150%, Dad!"
My God! The influence of Jeremy Kyle and Simon Cowell has spread its evil influence throughout Mangold Parva primary school.
I informed Gracie that "per cent" means 100. Therefore it is impossible to have 150%. She looked up at me with what seemed like pity.
The child was excited because the headmistress, Mrs Bull, had announced at assembly the school's plans for celebrating the royal wedding. Every child is to be given a souvenir oven glove and Gracie's class will sing "Rehab" by Amy Winehouse.
TUESDAY
I've been asked by the chairman of the parish council, Arnold Bush, to write, direct, produce, market, finance and publicise a playlet about the royal wedding. Due to there being no public buildings left in the village we met at my house.
He said: "The play'll 'av to be put on before the 29th, mind you. Cos I'm taking the wife to Skegness for the sake of her chest, I've hired a caravan with no telly." He looked around my home and said: "I remember this when it were a pig sty, I liked it better then."
After he'd gone, I rang my former wife, Daisy, and asked if I could use the ballroom at her new husband's manor house for rehearsals.
She said: "It costs £3,000 a day to hire our ballroom."
I said: "Can't you do it as a favour?"
She said: "Ex-wives don't do favours."
I said: "Back in the day, I could hire the village hall for £3 and a bottle of Dettol. And it was only 50p for the use of the samovar."
"Samovar!" she scoffed. "Who do you think you are, Count Tolstoy? Normal people call it an urn."
I said: "Our daughter will be starring as Kate Middleton in the play I'm writing about the royal wedding."
Daisy said: "But you loathe the royal family. You said they were parasites burrowing into the flesh of the suffering citizenry."
I said, curtly: "That was before I met Princess Anne when she toured the new Waitrose."
Daisy said: "What did she say to you?"
I was reluctant to tell Daisy, but I said: "She asked me how long I'd been waiting and I said not long. But you must promise not to divulge what was a private conversation to the media."
Daisy said: "I've already forgotten it." She laughed and put the phone down.
5am Wrote the playlet overnight. It's seriously good. I have called it Much Ado About Nothing or has that been used before? It sounds very familiar.
7am Just recalled that Much Ado About Nothing was written by Samuel Johnson! I have retitled the playlet Kiss Me Kate.
forrás: http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/apr/17/adrian-mole-royal-wedding-diary?INTCMP=ILCNETTXT3487
Ezt most találtam, és hogy meglegyen mindenképpen.
