Peter and Jane and the Summer Fete.

Today, Mummy is taking Peter and Jane to the Summer Fete at school.

Mummy would rather be putting pins in her eyes.

Summer Fetes, Mummy feels, should be held in the grassy grounds of the Vicarage, with Miss Marple skipping about to the jolly tones of the local brass band, twirling her pearls as she solves the pleasantly bloodless murder of the nice, young Vicar, who has been offed for discovering a Dark Secret about one of his parishioners.

The Dark Secret would hopefully be that Perfect Lucy Atkinson's Perfect Mummy has a raging cocaine habit that she supports by working as a high class call girl.

Instead the Summer Fete is held in the barren, concrete waste ground of the school playground.

Mummy still has her suspicions about Perfect Mrs Atkinson though.

Peter and Jane arrive at the Summer Fete with Mummy.

A black cloud reeking of charred animal fat and burning sugar drifts across the playground.

Peter and Jane are very excited. 

"MONEY MONEY MONEY!!!!" Peter and Jane chant at Mummy.

"CANDYFLOSS CANDYFLOSS CANDYFLOSS!" they howl.

"BURGER BURGER BURGER!" they scream.

In a futile attempt at parenting, Mummy decrees that the candyfloss must come after the burger.

Perfect Mr Atkinson is manning the barbecue.

He does not look quite so perfect today, he looks quite hot and sweaty.

"That will be £15!" says Mr Atkinson brightly.

"What the actual fuck?" says Mummy.

Mr Atkinson looks wounded.  "It is for the school!" he tells Mummy "The Fete is to raise money for the children.  Won't you think of the children?"

Mummy prefers not to think of the children if she possibly can.

Since Mummy had to pay £15 for three Burgers of Death, she nibbles at hers tentatively, but she cannot shake the thought that Mr Atkinson has possibly sweated onto it. 

Mummy has paid £15 to eat Mr Atkinson's sweat. 

Mummy puts her burger in the bin.

"CANDYFLOSS!!!!" snarl Peter and Jane.

"Oh, fuck it." thinks Mummy "It is not like they can get any more hyper, can they?"

On the way to the candyfloss stall, they pass the Home Baking Stand, where Perfect Mrs Atkinson is standing, steely eyed and ruthless.

"Buy cake!" Mrs Atkinson orders Mummy.

"Errrr." says Mummy, eyeing the dispirited selection of lop sided Victoria sponges, brick-like banana loaves and strange lumpen things that may or may not be scones.

"Of course, you're too late for my cupcakes." says Mrs Atkinson smugly.  "You have to be quick for them, they sold out immediately."

"Oh, do shove your perfect fucking cupcakes up your perfect fucking arsehole." thinks Mummy, as she finally decides one of the pissed sponge cakes is the safest bet.  

"£7.50" says Mrs Atkinson "FOR THE CHILDREN." she adds menacingly, as Mummy hands over a tenner with a whimper.

"Oh dear" says Mrs Atkinson "I don't seem to have any change left.  I tell you what, I'll pop in a couple of these lovely scones and we'll call it £10."

Jane has spotted pony rides.  

"POOOOOOONNNNNNNYYYYYYY" screeches Jane as she dashes towards the dejected pony trudging in circles.

Meanwhile, Peter has spotted the tombola, and is racing towards that.

Mummy gives up trying to keep Peter and Jane together and hurls money at Peter while she runs after Jane, ponies seeming more dangerous to Mummy than the innocent fun of a tombola.

Mummy and Jane wait in the queue for the pony rides.

Perfect Lucy Atkinson is ahead of them in the queue.

"Can I have a pony, Daddy?" says Lucy.

"Maybe, Poppet, I will have a chat to Mummy about it." says Mr Atkinson.

"Thank you, Daddy, that sounds a most reasonable answer, and I'm sure what ever you and Mummy decide will be the right thing to do." says Lucy.

"Can I have a pony, Mummy?" says Jane.

"No." says Mummy.

"Why not?" says Jane.

"Because I say so." says Mummy.

"I WANT A FUCKING PONY!  PONY PONY PONY!" bellows Jane.

"Oh God, if I say I will think about it, will you stop screaming?" says Mummy.

Jane has had five three minute pony rides at five pounds each, when Mummy remembers Peter and the tombola.

Peter is glassy eyed in front of the tombola, surrounded by discarded tickets.  It seems in her haste Mummy gave Peter a twenty pound note, not a fiver, and Peter appears to be showing all the early signs of a gambling addiction.

Peter has won a cracked vase; a box of soap that expired in 1998; a set of drawer liners to match the soap; a bottle of 'Bulgarian Country Wine' and a terrifying plaster model of a clown.

However, these prizes are as nothing to Peter: he is playing to win the battered box of Lego that is still up for grabs.

"More money!" he grunts at Mummy.

Mummy has finally managed to drag Peter and Jane out of the Summer Fete.

Mummy has spent £75, and has nothing to show for it except Peter's tombola prizes; inedible cakes; a possible case of salmonella and a headache.

Mummy is going home to drink the Bulgarian Country Wine and anything else alcoholic she can get her hands on.

"Don't forget about my pony!" says Jane for the twenty ninth time in five minutes.

Peter and Jane and Parents' Night

Today, it is Parents' Night at Peter and Jane's school.

Peter and Jane have come along to Parents' Night with Mummy and Daddy because Bloody Granny is on another cruise and Mummy isn't forking out for a babysitter for Parents' Night, especially with the rate Granny is spending Daddy's inheritance.

Daddy offered to stay at home with Peter and Jane but Mummy was not falling for that old chestnut again, and anyway, she suspects the school is starting to think she is a mad fantasist who has invented a husband, due to Daddy's great skill at making up excuses.

If Mummy had invented a husband, she would have invented a better one than Daddy.

Peter says "Look at the paintings outside my classroom!  Can you tell which one is mine?  Do you like it?"

Mummy and Daddy cannot tell which painting is Peter's unless they look at the name at the bottom, because all the paintings look exactly the same, with slightly varying degrees of shitness.

Mummy thinks that it is nice to see that Freddie Dawkins has finally stopped painting using his own bodily excretions though.

Peter's teacher calls Mummy and Daddy into the classroom.

Mummy and Daddy cram themselves into the humiliating small children's chairs, while the teacher looms above them in her Proper Grown Up's Chair and Position Of Authority, and Mummy and Daddy try to smile ingratiatingly in a way that says "We are respectable, middle class parents, honestly".

Peter's teacher is called Mrs Jackson.

Mrs Jackson thought she would have retired to the Costa Del Sol with Mr Jackson at least five years ago, but Mr Jackson ran off with a perky, blonde, thirtysomething slapper he met in the Foreign Food aisle in Asda, and so Mrs Jackson and her shattered dreams are still here, nursing her bitterness against the world under the guise of imparting knowledge and wisdom to young minds.  If only she had sent him to Waitrose for that jar of olives.

Mrs Jackson regrets the new political correctness that forces her to say positive things about the hateful little bastards who try to suffocate her with their farts and fatuous questions each day, but Mr Jackson cashed in the pension fund to pay for his new twins, and Mrs Jackson needs this job.

"Peter is a very spirited child" says Mrs Jackson, by which she means "Have you considered Ritalin?"

"Peter has a very unique way of looking at the world." adds Mrs Jackson, meaning "It's a shame they closed the Borstals, he's a prime candidate, the little fucker."

Mrs Jackson says "Peter needs to learn to manage his challenging behaviour by himself." because Mrs Jackson will go prison if she belts him.

Mrs Jackson says "Perhaps we can work together to find ways to help Peter focus." ie "If you put Haribo in that little twatbag's lunchbox one more time, I am going to find you and I AM GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!!!!!!"

After Mrs Jackson, it is time to find Jane's classroom.

There are many gaudy paintings outside Jane's classroom too, with Perfect Lucy Atkinson's shitty copy of Van Gogh's Sunflowers taking pride of place amongst the other admittedly slightly more shitty copies.

"Where is your painting, Jane?" asks Mummy.

"I destroyed it in a protest against the subjective institutional prejudices of the establishment.  I will only make art for the sake of art, not for the tawdry baubles of shallow reward The Man tries to buy our souls with." replies Jane loftily.

Mummy assumes this means Jane ate her painting in a fit of rage because Perfect Lucy Atkinson's painting was deemed better than hers, and resolves that maybe letting Jane watch BBC4 wasn't quite the educational experience Mummy had hoped for.

"That's nice, darling." says Mummy. 

Jane's teacher calls them in and Mummy and Daddy once more perch uncomfortably.

Jane's teacher is called Miss Melrose. Miss Melrose is 23 and this is her very first job as a teacher.

At the start of the year, Miss Melrose was a shapely bouncing bundle of pink cheeked enthusiasm, ready to shape young minds and influence the future.

Miss Melrose could already see the interviews with the future greats and goods of the country in which they named Miss Eleanor Melrose as the most significant figure of their formative years.

Miss Melrose was pretty sure by the end of the first week her class would be standing on their chairs and shouting "Oh Captain, my Captain!" when she walked in.

Six months later, Miss Melrose is ashen faced and has gained two stone, as comfort eating chocolate HobNobs under her desk while crying is now her sole pleasure in life.

"Jane is very creative." mumbles Miss Melville.

"We need to help Jane to channel that creativity in a positive way."

Miss Melville's voice says this, but her eyes say "Help me.  Please help me to stop Jane from stabbing the other children when they thwart her.  The other day she found my  HobNobs and made me pay twenty pounds to get them back.  She is feral.  Please make it stop.  Please"

Mummy and Daddy try and remove their knees from their nostrils and remember how to walk upright.  

Parents' Night is much nicer for the parents now no one is allowed to tell them their child is a shit-for-brains delinquent.

Mummy and Daddy leave feeling quite proud of Peter and Jane.

If they can ever shift the stench of decades old gravy and child fart from their coats, it could be considered quite a successful night. 

Peter and Jane Go To The Swimming Pool

Today, Peter and Jane are going swimming, because they are holding Mummy to a rash and foolish promise Mummy made in a moment of weakness.

They are holding Mummy to her promise by whining on and on about when are they going to go swimming, until Mummy concludes it is less painful to just take them bloody swimming, than to have to keep listening to the moaning about swimming.

Daddy is not coming swimming with Peter and Jane, because Daddy has made up a pathetic excuse about how he has to stay at home and fix things around the house in a manly way.

Mummy knows perfectly well that the minute she leaves the house Daddy will go and watch football on the TV.  

In the unlikely event that there is no football on the TV, Daddy will watch stupid programmes about building cars instead, because Daddy is a knob, with crap taste in TV.

However, the whinging from Daddy if she makes him come swimming with them will be even worse than the whining from Peter and Jane if she does not take them swimming, so Mummy lets Daddy stay at home because she cannot face dragging a third bloody child out swimming.

"Go and pack your swimming bags" says Mummy to Peter and Jane.

Mummy checks the swimming bags.

Peter has packed Seal Sticks, goggles, three balls and a water pistol, but has no towel or swimming trunks.

Jane has packed five different swimming costumes because she 'couldn't decide', four towels 'in case', and seven lip glosses, three eyeshadows, hair mascara, glitter and seventeen different hair accessories 'for afterwards.

Mummy says "Peter, where are your swimming trunks and towel?  Jane, I have told you before that just because we have to take off our clothes in public, I am not going to let you leave looking like a tiny Vegas stripper."

Peter looks at Mummy blankly, and Jane looks at Mummy mutinously as Mummy repacks both bags.

In the swimming pool changing rooms, Peter and Jane immediately strip off all their clothes and hurl them in as many directions as possible.

Mummy repeatedly shouts "Pick up your fucking clothes!  Put on your sodding swimming costumes!" as Peter and Jane hurtle naked around the room, looking for pools of water left by previous occupants in which they can slip and hurt themselves and thus scream at Mummy while Mummy snarls "I fucking told you so!" and old ladies look on and tut.

Mummy finally grabs Peter and Jane and thrusts their swimming costumes at them, at which point Peter and Jane decide to deny any knowledge of ever being able to dress themselves, and so Mummy has to hoist them into their costumes herself if she wants to escape this bacteria smeared shithole any time before Christmas.

Lastly, Mummy has to wrestle herself into her own swimming costume while Peter and Jane stare at her beadily in the hope of catching a glimpse of her unmentionables so they can ask loud, awkward questions about where babies come from.

Mummy realises too late that she really should have had a bikini wax before this outing.

Peter and Jane race out the changing rooms into the pool, while Mummy trails after them, ineffectually shrieking "Don't run!  Don't jump! FUCKS SAKE!" as Peter cannonballs into the water on top of an old lady swimming sedate lengths.

Mummy gingerly lowers herself into the pool, trying not to think about other people's feet, or how many of the old ladies in the pool are likely to be incontinent.

After half an hour, most of which Peter and Jane have spent running round the bastarding pool, rather than in the fetid water, Mummy is hoarse from screaming her mantra of "Don't RUN!  Don't JUMP!  FUCKS SAKE!!!" and she can no longer bear the judgemental looks of the life guard and tells Peter and Jane that it is time to get out.

"NOOOOOOO!" scream Peter and Jane "NOT YET!  Five more minutes!"

Mummy is being firm and putting her foot down.  "No."  says Mummy "We are getting out now!"

Peter and Jane continue to screech.

"OK" says Mummy, as another part of her soul dies, "Just five more minutes."

Back in the death trap changing rooms, Mummy thrusts Peter and Jane into shower cubicles, carefully adjusts the temperature to a child friendly lukewarm and tells them to take off their costumes and get washed and not to touch the shower controls,

in the vain hope that she might avoid bathtime tonight.

Mummy gets into the shower herself to wash off the foot soup from the pool, and as soon as she has taken her costume off Peter roars "MY SHOWER HAS GONE BURNY HOT!!!" and Jane screechs "MY SHOWER HAS GONE ICY COLD!!!"

Mummy gets out and readjusts the temperatures and tells them again not to touch the shower controls.

This scenario is repeated several times before Mummy gives up and hauls Peter and Jane out of the shower.

When Peter and Jane are finally dressed, they begin to demand to go to the cafe for hot chocolate, invoking once again the magic words 'you promised!'

"I did not fucking promise" says Mummy "I said we might, if you were good, and you weren't good, you were twatting little shit bags, so now we are going home because Mummy needs a fucking drink, not to have her pain insulted with a cup of pishy crap coffee."

At home, Daddy has carefully got out lots of dangerous tools and left them lying around the house for Peter and Jane to find.

Daddy is drinking beer and watching car programmes on the TV at the same time as watching football on his phone.

"Hello"says Daddy "Did you all have lots of fun at swimming?"

Mummy looks at the hammer Daddy has so foolishly left lying within reach and thinks again about a shallow grave in the woods.

Peter and Jane Go Camping

Today it is the start of a  Bank Holiday weekend, and Peter and Jane are going camping with Mummy and Daddy.

It has taken quite a lot of persuasion for Daddy to get Mummy to go camping.

Mummy went camping once before with the Girl Guides and it ended rather badly when the Guide Leader confiscated Mummy's fags and told her she was a disgrace to Girl Guiding.

Mummy was already aware she was a disgrace to Girl Guiding, but she was annoyed about her fags.

This time Daddy has promised that there will be booze, and Mummy had to give up smoking anyway because Peter and Jane's school brainwashed them into being very judgmental about it.

It is hard to enjoy a crafty fag when you are being stalked by small children who jump out at you screaming "YOU ARE GOING TO DIIIIIIIIE!!!!!"

Mummy has actually rather come round to the idea of camping and has visions of Breton tops and hampers and Enid Blyton style japes and frolics on the beach, and some really good smug Instagram opportunities.

Despite all the evidence to the contrary, Mummy is an eternal optimist.  A mostly drunken optimist, but an optimist all the same.

Mummy has packed a selection of adorable shoes and floaty skirts and several bottles of gin and lugs her suitcase and her hamper out to Daddy's car.

"What the fuck are they?" says Daddy as he surveys her luggage.

Daddy and Peter and Jane appear to have only packed a selection of nasty nylon rucksacks.

Mummy does not do rucksacks.

After a brief row, Daddy grudgingly loads the suitcase, and the booze stuffed hamper in to the car.

Mummy distinctly hears Daddy mutter "This is fucking ridiculous" about her hamper, but she chooses to ignore him, for she knows he will be glad of it when they arrive at the adorable campsite.

Peter and Jane and Mummy and Daddy set off.

Daddy has to drive, because Mummy is not allowed to drive Daddy's car, because he doesn't understand that it is not really Mummy's fault that she quite often accidentally drives into things by mistake, and Daddy refuses to travel in Mummy's car because apparently it 'stinks'.  Mummy thinks Daddy is a supercilious bastard, but she can have a little sleep if he drives.

The sun is shining and Mummy made being allowed to play her Nineties Hits CD in the car a condition of coming, and everything is really quite lovely.

After half an hour, the Bank Holiday Traffic Jams start. 

As the car grinds to a halt, Jane screams "Peter is looking at me." 

"I am not!" shouts Peter.

"YES YOU ARE!  WHY ARE YOU LOOKING AT ME!  STOP LOOKING AT ME!" shrieks Jane.

"I AM NOT FUCKING LOOKING AT YOU!  YOU ARE TOO UGLY TO LOOK AT!" bellows Peter.

"Mummy, tell Peter to stop looking at me NOW!" Jane screeches.

Mummy remains quite serene throughout this exchange, because Mummy had the foresight to stash little cans of G&T in her handbag, and she has already had three.

Daddy is not as serene.  There is a vein throbbing in Daddy's temple in a most alarming way.

"SHUT UP!" howls Daddy "SHUT UP OR I WILL LEAVE YOU AT THE SIDE OF THE ROAD!"

"What about a nice game of ISpy?" slurs Mummy.

"I really, really, really need a wee." says Peter.

Three hours later, Mummy and Daddy and Peter and Jane arrive at the campsite.

After an hour in the traffic jam, Peter had to wee into one of Mummy's empty gin cans.

It is with difficulty that he is made to put the can of piss in the bin, as he is determined to keep it as a souvenir.

The campsite is not entirely what Mummy expected.  It is a field, with tents in it.  And some mobile home caravans.  And a very Soviet looking toilet block.  Mummy had presumed there would be bunting, and perhaps some jaunty old fashioned gypsy caravans.  Maybe ponies.

"Help me put the tent up." says Daddy.

Mummy looks at Daddy blankly.  Mummy cannot think of one single thing she has ever done in her life that could have given Daddy the impression that she might know how to help put a tent up.

Mummy mutters a vague excuse about taking Jane to the toilet and wanders off, leaving Daddy and Peter to deal with the tent.

    

Daddy has finally got the tent up, and Peter has stopped having hysterics after getting trapped inside in the process.

Mummy is sitting in the sunshine with another little gin, and thinking that despite the unsatisfactory toilet situation and the general fieldiness of the field she is in, camping is not so bad.  There is a nice pub just outside the field, where Mummy has insisted they will be going for dinner, and there will be plenty of wine and chips, and Mummy has taken lots of really good photos and put them on Instagram.

Mummy is not entirely sure where Peter and Jane are, but she thinks they have probably gone to have some japes and frolics and will doubtless come back when they have thwarted the plans of a dastardly gang of lower class criminals.

At bedtime, the horrid reality of what she has done dawns on Mummy.  

Mummy has allowed herself to be blinded by visions of Breton tops and Instagram smugness and now Mummy is going to have to sleep in a field!  In a tent, with Peter and Jane and Daddy.

Mummy is in her sleeping bag.  Mummy is not happy about this.

Daddy farts.  Peter farts.  Jane farts.

Daddy snores.  Peter snores.  Jane snores.

Mummy is trapped in a noisy nylon bag of stench and outside it is dark and there is field and there might be cows and the only place to wee has already been wee'd in many times by dubious sorts who don't look like they shop at Waitrose.

Mummy is not drunk enough for this shit.

The next morning it is raining.  The tent is wet.  Mummy is wet.  The hamper is wet. Peter and Jane are wet.  Daddy is not wet because he is a smug twat and has some special hi-tech jacket.  If the jacket was slightly less fucking ugly, Mummy would demand he lend it to her, but Mummy has standards and she would rather be a drowned rat than wear anything so hideous.

The people staying in the caravans look out complacently at Mummy shivering in the rain.

Mummy thinks "What has it come to that I am envying the caravan people?"

Mummy says "Fuck this shit Daddy, we are going home."