It's the first day of the summer holidays. I woke this morning to what I thought was the sound of rain; in my sleepy mind the parched garden was being bathed in soft, beads of water, the plants drinking greedily, their drooping stems filling and firming, their blossoms brightening. I used to dream about sex in the mornings, but now, now I dream about irrigation. Something is very wrong; I'll be fantasising about Alan Titchmarsh next, and then I'll know it'll be time to book myself into the nearest 'bad sex with men in cardigans' addiction clinic. Instead of tell-tale track lines down my arms, I'll be displaying the classic symptoms of a woman lost in the fluffy tummybutton world of 'Is it in yet? Can't you take your gardening gloves off first? Don't squash my reading glasses, Ouch. Can you help me with this Suduko puzzle when you've finished down there?'

If I did ever get hot and bothered about a man like Mr. Titchmarsh I'd know for sure that the last of my marbles had finally been knocked into that small, dusty hole on the school field of my brain, and snatched up by that annoying little tyke in the scruffy shorts who already has far too many of his own rolling about in his capacious pockets. I'd be certifiable. I don't want to think nasty, bad-girl thoughts about a middle aged man, just as I don't want the dating agency to match me up with somebody called Derek - but that's just what's happened. Now, I know I'm not as young as I used to be, and I shouldn't rule a man out just because of his name, but I just can't imagine myself with a Derek. I feel young, I'm very fit, I don't embarrass my daughters with my musical tastes and I'm just not ready for a life of cocoa, Bridge and Battenburg. My life isn't beige, it's vibrant and colourful and I'm looking for a man who can keep up (and not just with the aid of his motorised shopping trolley.) The trouble is, that when I told my friends about my latest match, half of them said, 'Give him a go', and the other half said that a Derek should only ever be seen sitting far out in the North Sea, being roughly manhandled by greasy-faced riggers with thick, oily fingers. After giving the matter some thought I have decided to pass on this particular match and I hope at least half of my friends approve...

But back to reality. I have just embarked on the long, long drag of the summer holidays. I don't spoil my girls, but I do think that children nowadays have no idea how to amuse themselves. They look to me for entertainment and I'm just not interested when there's a houseful of electronic gadgetry, a barnful of bikes and enough sports equipment to host a mini Olympic games. When I was a girl I used to while away the idle days of summer in a variety of ways. I played bicycle polo up and down the lane with a toy croquet mallet and a plastic ball, which, it has to be said is a bit boring when nobody else is playing, but that didn't seem to deter me. Whilst my sisters were off with their ponies, I wandered around the churchyard opposite our house, finding hedgehog families and other items, which proved irresistible to an eight-year-old girl with rather more curiosity and free time than is good for her.

I once went to the graveyard on a particularly dull summer's day and found a freshly dug grave. Not knowing about burial protocol, I had a good old rummage in the spoil heap and found some very interesting bits and bobs, which I put in a bag and took home to my mother. I thought she'd be interested in my offerings, but she didn't seem overly pleased to come downstairs and find a small plastic bag of human bones sitting on her kitchen worktop. It was a bit like Can't Cook, Won't Cook meets Shaun of the Dead. I'd never seen my mother go white before, but I knew I'd done a very bad thing, and after I'd put the bones back I never went looking for buried treasure in the graveyard again.

But regardless of my occasional grave misdemeanours, I did manage to amuse myself pretty well during the long summer holidays, and without the aid of a Playstation or a computer. Bah humbug, I can feel myself turning beige as I type.

I'm not going anywhere today, there's cleaning to be done and shoes to be put away, and a whole term's worth of junk to be cleared out of the porch. It's 11.00am and we're still in our pyjamas, but who cares? We have six, long weeks stretching ahead of us, with no work and no school, so there doesn't seem any reason to hurry. We're not having a holiday abroad this summer, but are expecting a visit from our Californian friends. It's getting closer and closer to the day of their arrival and I'm starting to get major feelings of inadequacy. I don't have a Korean gardener or a Mexican cleaner and I've begun to think that my garden is a bit too scruffy, and my house a touch too shabby. Only my new drive seems up to the mark, but I'm sure Sharon and Gregg will not be interested in looking for cobwebs on the ceiling or weeds in the herbaceous border. They've come to see us, and we're going to do our best to show them a wonderful time. I talked to Sharon on the phone last night, and she seemed very excited at the prospect of visiting England for the first time. Talking to Sharon is like playing verbal tennis with a pro. I try my best to wrong foot her, lobbing up a succession of deadpan wisecracks, but she never fails to return them. Having good friends I can laugh with is such a joy to me, and one of the problems I have with finding a suitable man is that he just has to be able to provide mental stimulation. Humour for me has to be bone dry, and finding a man who can keep up with the vagaries of my scatter-gun asides is no easy task. In the meantime, I know lots of women who help to keep me sharp. I have Julie and Jemma at work, Beth at home, Sharon in America, and tonight I'm going to spend the evening with Julia. Julia used to work with Charlie, she started out on work experience, but soon blossomed into an extremely talented director. We only manage to get together a few times a year, but our inane conversation will reduce both of us to tears ten minutes after first meeting and have me spluttering out my Leffe Blond at various stages throughout the evening. It's always the same and there's barely a pause for breath, but if you asked me afterwards what we talked about I'd be hard pushed to tell you. The company of good friends is what helps me keep my slight grip on sanity. Laughter is like a drug to me and I can't imagine life without it.


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