WARNING

Thinking about Sex and The City, and how some people don’t like it because of SJP or whatever. I don’t think I see SATC so much as hear it; it’s all column and my mind seems to be fastened on that – it probably wouldn’t matter to me who played the parts as long as the acting didn’t get in the way of the words (is SATC a blog?).

My brain is a very mysterious thing; sometimes it doesn’t recognise and add up the total of what’s being said – it just concentrates on the melody. I’ve been singing certain songs for years but only recently noticed that I don’t really know what the song is about; I haven’t been listening to the words, well not completely – think I stop somewhere before the middle so that I can never sing a song by myself right to the end.

I’m faulty; a broken computer – not in control of my faculties. It must be the kids; they made me what I am – they turned me into a monster. It was in fact them who helped me discover the switch so I could turn the abominable noise off; when Carrie came over to mine she couldn’t bear it and was amazed that I, obviously, could – she only had one child. I could read a book in the middle of screaming, whining and complaining (as long as I didn’t have a hangover). Having three kids was just insane.

So has that switch come a bit loose over the years? Can I only focus on one thing at a time? I can still multi-task but only if I talk to myself. There was a time when I couldn’t read or study with music on: now I can sit in my own little bubble of silence in the middle of football and sport conversations. When this happens my daughter will say, ‘Mum’s gone.’ And I used to have a problem with noisy neighbours, barking dogs but even their kind have receded – I have no need for ear plugs when I have that inner world as a retreat.

Does all this mean that I’ll be barking before I’m seventy? Or am I already there and just don’t recognise the signs? Should I be slipping into my purple and choosing a good walking stick?