"The thing about Granny's house is that you think nothing bad can happen to you there," says Revered Son.

I've done six days now, and I'm beginning to worry that I seem to have nothing to worry about.  I also struggle to manage nine hours sleep, when I'm used to seven.

It's the sort of house where you can go upstairs in your boots, and all the mirrors are speckly because Granny isn't really interested in appearances.  Her face is a patchwork quilt, and her knuckles are of endless fascination to RS. I dare say I shall look similar soon.  At least I will be shorter than I am now - Granny has shrunk by about six inches so far.

But her home is calm and feels safe.  Even all the in-laws, and ex-in-laws, find they can completely relax here.

Granny has been in a bit of a state for the past week because she is partially responsible for the annual (there has been one before) Hymns and Pimms evening tonight at the local church - where I got married 20 years ago, so I know that it seats precisely 70, as we personally measured each pew with our bums.  I read recently, or heard it on Jeremy Vine, that a chemical is released that makes you more anxious and cautious as you get older.  Well that chemical has been released in Granny and I hope they have found an antidote for it by the time it's my turn.

Anyway - there must have been 70 people there, as the church was full.  Granny read a lesson, and I felt a lump in my throat, as if it had been 12 year old Beloved Daughter.  She had been up to the church earlier to practise, and it showed. Dad, who used to train young Etonians to read in Eton College Chapel, would have been proud of her immaculate and dignified performance.


I was a bit unprepared for the hymns part of the evening to include prayers as well - the less involved with praying I get, the odder it all seems.  And I felt that I could have played the organ in a slightly more rousing fashion - although I have always found 'Jerusalem' a bit tricky.


And then, being Mum's daughter and on parade, despite having just got off a horse, I had to help, which has never been my strong point.  I found myself handing round delicious smelling mini smoked salmon vol au vents, which, of course, I wasn't able to enjoy myself because my hands were full.


Well the thing was it was really fun.  And I just loved meeting Mum's local community.  They are charming do-ers, mostly of my kind of age, and I am quite envious of her.  one of them even knew two of the couples I've watched being featured on Four In a Bed!


But the coup d'etat was meeting a beautiful talented 16 yr old girl who sang a solo of the first verse of "I Vow to Thee My Country" even better than SueBo, who will be at school with Beloved Daughter, and who has already come across Revered Son at some awful festival or other.  


Post Hymns and Pimms, they were in touch via Facebook even more quickly than I could manage via texting, and he will be cycling over to her house from here on his return from gallivanting around SW6 tomorrow.  So church is still bringing young people together, just like in the days of Thomas Hardy.

My ladylike glow turned into rivers of sweat running down my face, my back, and under my arms.  My heart started beating really fast and my tummy clenched.

Three tons of horse behind me, Revered Son oblivious under his headphones beside me, and I couldn't steer.  Was I imagining things? We had to round another small corner and the car felt funny again. Help!  I put on the hazard warning lights and slowed to a crawl up the hill, as the engine started going twang, kerplunk, ping;  and, after what felt like an eternity, I just managed to manoeuvre myself into the new service station opposite Exeter Racecourse.

Calling the AA was top priority, but my card was lost after the last call-out just a week ago, and my phone was low. The AA said they'd be out in two hours but could not take responsibility for the horses.  It was 4.55pm and everyone would be going home in five minutes time.  Unbelievably there was no phone number listed for the first Exeter 4x4 rental place I managed to track down on Chrome.  But White Horse Motors,  at 5.02pm, answered my call, and delivered the most enormous Isuzu to me within 20 minutes.  Meanwhile the AA arrived with their rescue truck to take away my old Nissan.  "It's just three snapped cables" they said.  "It'll cost £45 plus the cost of the cables plus VAT, ready by Tuesday when you have to return the hire car."


At this point there were two rescue trucks, the AA van, the Isuzu, the Nissan and the trailer all there to rescue me, on my long trek to my Mum's.  We took up most of the carpark!  And I was £325 down.


A giant juggernaut in a tunnel,  and an oversized tractor pulling a massive trailer of hay in a tiny lane later, we finally arrived at the livery just outside Beaminster, where I kept my first horse 22 years ago.  A journey which should have taken two hours, had taken six.


But I was finally here.


My second holiday of the month about to begin!

Someone is reading  this.  In fact two people are.  I've no idea who you are, but I'm chuffed to bits!

You've commented below  - that you've no idea 'why?'.

This is because I couldn't complete the editorial part of this Blog for ages, as JustHost, the people who support my site, appear not to have managed to make their system work for i-pads.  So finally now I find myself on my Mums four year old Acer in her kitchen, because I've rented  out Wydemeet and have nowhere else to go, and no access to my normal computer.

Yesterday I rang up JustHost in America at midnight and yelled "Your country managed to put men on the moon 42 years ago (or was it? and did they actually - the photo was all wrong) so why cant you make your stupid system work on the most popular and common tablet (or whatever its called) of all in the whole world?!"  The bloke said 'Have a nice day' and hung up on me.

I have written to Manchester City Council about their taxi operators, and they have written back predictably saying that without reference numbers they cant do anything.  Rubbish.  They can tell their drivers to learn English, learn their way around Manchester without the use of satnav, and to smile.

I have written to Nielson who have predictably come back charmingly, saying they'll look into the matter over the next 28 days.

I have written to the Manchester Airport Inn who predictably have not replied.  I have also written them a review on Trip Advisor which is so bad that the Trip Advisor computer came back to me saying, "please press this button if you really meant to mention bedbugs in your review."  So I pressed the button.

I currently have court cases pending regarding Bill (my Shogun), BT, and a plumber from five years ago who is of no fixed abode.

My Angry of Wydemeet filing drawer is full to bursting, and I am finding being so permanently cross is very tiring and doesn't produce a flattering wrinkle formation.

What I don't understand is what normal people do when they find themselves being treated as idiots, as happens to me so often.  Do they just let it go, so that the perpetrators go on to rip off more innocent, gentle, busy people who aren't in a position to stand up to them?

You tell me.

With best regards (and immense gratitude to my two readers)

Bridget Clarkson

We went to The Hurlingham Club/Verbier-On-Sea, otherwise known as Polzeath Beach, today.

I looked the same as everyone else.

"Are you expecting some kind of menage-a-trois or something?" I shouted, and I'm afraid to say I hurled the door key across the reception desk at the smug, dour, two young scousers sitting behind it.

It was 3.30am Turkey time. The first taxi at Manchester Airport had refused to take us to our hotel because 'they didn't know where it was'.  The second taxi kept driving for miles whilst I repeated 'Altrincham Road' over and over again, and dropped us at what turned out to be the wrong hotel in the opposite direction of where we were trying to go.  It took ages for another taxi to arrive and £30 later we arrived at the Britannia Airport Inn, just down the road from the airport, as I had planned, complete with indoor swimming pool. 

Avoid! Avoid! Avoid!

So it's 3.30am as I ask for the pre-booked triple room.  There's already been two cock-ups because the bookers originally booked me into the Gatwick Airport Inn, lucky I noticed, and then charged me £20 for the booking, instead of £117, which I kindly pointed out.  They unkindly didnt stick to the £20 quote (which I would have done, as I aim to offer a platinum service). The two young men surrupticiously glance at each other.

We open the bedroom door and it's one large bed with three sets of pillows on it. Revered Son is an enormous hairy 15 yr old, and Beloved Daughter scratches her eczma all night and kicks you in the head.  This is a no-go, and basically, dishonest.

So, half an hour later, they sort us into three rooms, but mine hasn't been cleaned.  Even I can't sleep in a stranger's sheets and use their towels.

So finally we are settled, as dawn begins to break. My alarm clock is packed in Beloved Daughter's suitcase on the other side of the hotel.  But I cant order an alarm call because the phone clearly hasn't worked for months.

In the morning the tv remote doesn't work.

At breakfast they have run out of mugs, bread (bread??!!) and bowls, my fruit salad is fizzy, and they've still got an hour to go. Meanwhile I hear that my neighbours' hair-dryer has caught fire. Then I see a rat running along the window-sill - oh no it's not, its's a MINK??!!

So I pop along for my recuperating swim and of course, there's no water in the pool.

You couldn't make it up.  And I haven't.

           I am the most beautiful person in Plymouth.

                              But the ugliest in all of Turkey.



I've been surrounded for the last week by a large group of young marrieds who've left me feeling old, unfit in both senses, very single, and generally past it (although still young and stunning when compared with the aquarobics class at my Plymouth-based UnHealth Club).

And I think they may be on the warpath.  Quake in your boots, Nielson's!  Your customers appear to be displeased that you have plonked the most glorious 5* £billion palatial hotel, meant for sailing, on what on the face of it, seems to be a surfers beach.

The company's strapline is 'Relax Hard' and that's just what most of their guests do.  These people rise at dawn for water skiing (normally cancelled because of the conditions).Then it's mountain biking. Then tennis. Then weightlifting. Then fitness classes including my three perennial hates: Zumba, Aquarobics and Pilates. Followed by Swimming, and Sailing (generally cancelled). And then back to the first three. There is not an ounce of fat between them all.  Except for Michael, the surgeon, who is so enormous that he has bosoms, and snores loudly on his sunbed.  And me of course.

At the end of the week there's a competition for 'The Most Perfect Family'.  Teeth implanter and I pretended to vomit into our raki, but I was actually very jealous when my charming, bald friend (yet another surgeon, who I met when he was sitting down, and when he got up he turned out to be 5'4"), his lovely daughter and delightful wife deservedly took the honour.

I cannot imagine a more determined, intelligent, powerful force of people if this lot get the bit between their teeth.  Even if most of them aren't very interesting.

They should be rounded up to sort out Putin and prevent World War 3, once they've dealt with Nielson's.

In the meantime, my diet starts the day the children begin their Autumn term.  

Lumps on head: 3: purple splodges on knees: 5; cuts on knees: 1; broken toes: 1 (maybe);  muscles aching: all I have, plus more that I didn't know that I had; missing tarty toe rings: 1; minutes spent with children: 0; passes from anybody, even girls: 0.

"Please would you give me a boat for girls," I say coyly, my pretty sarong fluttering gaily in the gale, my bejewelled flip-flops sparkling.

If I can't win through good sailing, I can win using tactics.   The eight most macho men of the resort, kitted out in black body armour, knuckle dusters and knee pads, and I, are choosing our Lasers (very fast and tippy sailing dinghies) for the Big Race.

At last we are sailing, and it's the most cut-throat event of the week - The Regatta.

Sure enough, I manage to take possession of the smallest Laser with the titchiest sail, while the blokey blokes opt for bigger, faster, more knarly (challenging) versions.

So I have already won the Laser 247 Class without setting foot in a boat.

The red flag goes up indicating conditions are too dangerous for amateurs in single hulled dinghies.

Off 25 amateurs in single hulled dinghies charge, all attempting to start at the same time between two rather close-together buoys, and no brakes between us. "Starboard!!" I scream, and the nicest, most dashing young Dad of the resort smashes into me hard.  "I thought you were meant to be good at sailing!" I hurl at him, struggling hard not to fall overboard.  It's dinghy dodgems!

Two crashes and quite a lot of swimming later; I finally stagger in to shore - triumphant and exhausted.  Sailing is so nice when it stops.  For the past hour I appear to have been using my head to physically move the boom backwards and forwards, smashing my knees on the bottom of the boat, and all the ropes or sheets or whatever they're called are tangled up, trailing out over the stern (back).

I came 8th out of 25 in the end, being the only Lady-in-a-Laser and beaten only by Look-Alike-Wife among the few female participants.

Thank God that's sailing out of the way for at least another year.

Number of people to stand me up: 1; Wine Units: 227; Fags: 0; Barbequed Goat calories: 3,456; Balaclava calories: 0; minutes spent in riveting conversation: 240; number of giggles: 10; number of rows with Resort Owner: 1; number of passes by Turkish waiters: 0

Wow! What a night!  Just what I was hoping for!

Heads were turning knowingly over breakfast this morning, even though we had come down at different times.  This is how it went:

8.50pm: I am wandering around the bbq dining area but cant see anything because I refuse to wear glasses or contacts.  But plastic surgeon should be quite easy to spot because he is the only gentleman of mixed race in the resort.  Non.  How disappointing. No one.  I scour the bar area and finally alight on the silhouette of tooth implanter.  He looks like he is out of the movies.

9.00pm: We agree we have been stood up by plastic surgeon and enjoy our goat.  He comments with surprise: "You're funny".  I don't suppose he has ever been forced to dine with a Size 14, six foot in her heels, 54-year-old FunnyMummy before.  I giggle.  A lot.  How refreshing!

9.31pm:  Acoustioke Night in the bar

10.23pm: Plastic Surgeon turns up.  He had waited for us, given up and gone to another beach bar for supper with the flotilla-mob.

10.36pm:  Ginger Bloke with Looks-Like-Me-Wife turns up.  He tells us all how they managed to prove Shipman guilty, how he continued to kill even from the confines of prison, and why its not good or funny that Revered Son's friend is able to hack into the school software system and change all the exam grades. Ginger Bloke is one of the most interesting people I have come across for a very long time.

1.00am: we all depart happily to our separate beds, except presumably, Ginger Bloke and his Looks-Like-Me-Wife.

TripAdvisor Ranking: 8 (going down);  New Bookings: 0; Minutes spent worrying about this: 5.1/2; dates: 2

Last week we peaked in the Number 6 slot, thanks to even more, quite frankly, incredible reviews, but with my new marketing strategy - or lack of it - bookings are right down for the first half of July and then the whole house is rented out.  We are going to lose our place in the Premier League!

As Revered Son, Beloved Daughter and I set off on our mad trip to Turkey - a flight to Manchester followed by another to Dalaman ending with a four hour coach transfer to God knows where - we said goodbye to the couple who had just arrived.  They had almost immediately gone off with no research on the 1 1/2 hr hike to Princetown  wearing flipflops, and had very soon returned in some distress as the female half of said couple had been bitten by a horsefly.  Beloved daughter provided her with antihistamine and then they went off in their car.

Meanwhile lovely Sally arrived.  I found her through the Parish Magazine and I thought that she was so nice that all my guests would love her too.  So I invited her to look after the house, dog, horses and guests, in no particular order, for the week while we were away.

As we roared off in Marvin I had this terrible premonition that our new guests might not return in their car.  Thank goodness it was clearly me who had scared them off if so, rather than sweet Sally during her first hour of duties. 

7.24pm: Right now, I still have no idea whether they ever came back.

1.32pm: Had lunch with widowed plastic surgeon from Harrogate (burns not faces)

8.30pm: Turkish chef's Special Barbequed Goat Dinner, with widowed plastic surgeon from Harrogate, and ex-professional weightlifter/teeth implanter from Leicester. Must wash hair and get out best spray-on black wraparound ancient t-shirt dress, and agonising matching patent sky high killer heels. Thought: neither man is all that tall  but what the Hell.

Revered Son has lost the 'f' at the end of his name and has added a year to his age.

Its taken a couple of days, but he is already back to normal form, with his wraparound shades, baseball cap on back to front, and a trail of children wandering along behind him like the Pied Piper, only this time they are aged 16-18, and some of them are over 6' tall. I woke him up for waterskiing this morning and commented "Revered Son, you appear to have a large smear of mascara on your cheek."  He grinned proudly.  At lunchtime he was sitting next to a slim blonde young goddess draped in diaphanous pink chiffon.  His friends reassure me that he is what I would refer to as a lothario, not what they would refer to as a man-slag.

Meanwhile my new identity is pariah.  I am struggling with this as I am used to being centre of attention.

I am so interesting that a screenplay has been written about part of my life, and that's just some of it!  

Yet this week I find myself walking around grinning inanely to all, and making pleasant small talk to every tom, dick and pillock, but they're all doctors and surgeons.  Someone mentions the word NHS, if it is a word, at which point (Clarkson rant) they turn their backs on me in unison and have a competition as to who can squawk the loudest about how they're now working 210 times as hard as what they signed up to do, their pay has been cut by 7,000% and their pensions have turned into 21/2p a year.  As they buy another bottle of turkish chardonnay for three million turkish lire, and disappear off for an opi gel manipedicure, a 'Brush With Heaven' and back wax.

As I help myself to what's left of their wine.