Units of Turkish Wine: 502: fags: 111; Baclava Calorie Count: 15,432; Minutes spent with children: 0; interesting conversations: 0; number of times giggled: 0; passes from Turkish waiters: 0; passes from English Dads: 0; minutes spent sailing: 0; lengths swum: 20 (its an Olympic sized pool); wardrobe malfunctions: 1: (my swimming costume is a small size 12); clouds:0.

I love Bridget Jones.

"Might I join you?"

"No, we're having a family birthday party."

So I wander along to another table, with two couples  sitting at it, and, again, nervously, ask whether I might be able to take a seat there.

I swore never to attempt another sailing/beach resort holiday alone with my children, and here I am again, £4500 later, experiencing just the same thing.

This time its a Nielson holiday, rather than Sunsail which appears to be a bit on the ropes regarding beach holidays.

At Nielson, unlike Sunsail, they have a 'Social Table' which is the biggest one, so is usually occupied by the largest, happiest family groupings of all.  I would be fine all alone in a villa miles from anyone, but being surrounded by literally 100 functional happy families I find very difficult.

Networking is my thing, so I regularly invade various families every mealtime, but this time round so far none of them has proved very interesting.  Except for Jake, the professional weightlifter turned tooth implanter, with tinted hair, aged 51 but who looks ten years younger.

He is here with his two sons and is not interested in talking to anybody because he spends his working day making small talk to people who cant reply.

There is increaing unrest, shortly to become full rebellion I suspect, because it is a sailing holiday, but no one has as yet been out in a boat.  The quiet bay appears to have turned into a surfing beach so the black flag's up and we're not allowed to.

Both children have turned feral and have disappeared. So I have met my main objective which is for them to thrive socially in their kids clubs.  But they're not going to learn to sail.

And I'm not going to bump into a wealthy hearty six foot hunk of single posh Dad.

People that I like tend not to like Bridget Jones, Jeremy Clarkson, Britain's Got Talent, or people who drive Range Rovers. Or the Daily Mail, but that's different.

I am currently in the middle of 'Mad About The Boy', with "Is It Really Too Much To Ask?" lying by my side, missing my Range Rover and looking forward to tonight's 'Battle of the Bands" - this beach resort's version of BGT, and I am inspired!  I can write like BJ and JC! (I think..)

There are only two differences between me and Bridget Jones. 

One is that she's a Mother Who Tries Too Hard, while I favour the Benign Neglect approach.

Two is that she's made up and I exist.

There are also two differences between me and Jeremy Clarkson.  

I sometimes worry that I might have upset someone.

And I am not a bloke.

Bridget Jones is not believable because she claims to be a Sloane but says 'toilet', and also, in the book a 29 year old hunky decent bloke falls for her via twitter without even a photograph.  The chances of that are one in seventy-five trillion, as Clarkson might say.

Bridget Jones' books are structured over a blog-type thought occurring every minute or two.  Clarkson's all resound with, 'And there's the thing' every three pages, when he instructs us all on how easily he could achieve world peace.  Well I think I can probably copy both of them and publish a bestseller.

 The problem is that  if I do, the people I like won't like me.

Sometimes I look at Wydemeet's reviews on TripAdvisor, and I feel like crying.

One after the other after the other.  They are so touching. Every time some new guests arrive I get butterflies and think to myself, "They are going to be disappointed; they are going to be disappointed.  I can never live up to what it says on TripAdvisor."

So far, well. phew!  Everyone seems very happy.  More than happy.  Astonishingly happy!  I am soooo chuffed! But still constantly nervous too.

Anyhow, I've just had this brainwave.  All the internet dating sites seem so rubbish that here is another public 'portal', if that's the correct 'now' word.  So I just thought I would put in a little mention of my search for Mr Right on TripAdvisor! How cheeky is that?! I bet they censor it.  Anyway - we'll see - I've just done it this minute!

But, in the meantime, much more seriously and significantly, my lovely, lovely, lovely guests' enthusiasm has meant that, despite only being open for less than a year, and now only having two bedrooms, so by definition having limited numbers of guests who could have written anything, we have risen to the grand position of Number 8 out of 183 Dartmoor B&Bs, and we're still rising!! There isn't any real reason why we couldn't hit the Number 2 slot!  We will never beat the Apple Tree in Tavistock though.  They've got over 200 rave reviews, whereas we've only got 37.  The only negative comment they've ever had is that the car parking is a bit tight.

My latest wheeze is to make a hair appointment with the lady who runs it, and have a chinwag with her and pick her brains, while she gives me a trim.  She's also a hairdresser, apparently, and only in her thirties.  Respect! How Does She Do It?!

It must, by definition, be impossible to have an affair with a nice person.

Because if they were nice, they would say, "Yes I feel so much love for you too, but you must, must, must go back to your spouse - have counselling; do everything you can to keep the family together; do not betray your spouse nor your children. As I must not betray mine.  No, I just must not, cannot, even allow myself kiss you.  It would be wrong of me. Go now, go, and we need never speak of this again."

Having an affair means that you must both behave dishonourably and dishonestly. 

Your new love is flawed right from the beginning. And as a result, although obviously some work out OK for everybody involved, for most it would seem that the 'happy ever after' is an unlikely proposition. 

Personally I tend to go for 'dumpees' rather than 'dumpers'.  Dumpees seem to have a more steady neddy, sanguine approach to life; making the most of what is, and putting up with things, rather than expecting the grass always to be greener, and jumping.

I am probably just incredibly naive. But all this seems common sense to me.

Answers on a postcard please!

Dearly Beloved Daughter was in floods of tears when I picked her up from school a couple of days ago.  We are having an emotional week, her and me.

A boy in the year above, with whom she has been at various schools since she was two, called her 'fat, with a low voice' in front of the little chap she love(s/d) most, and some of her other friends.  Nobody stuck up for her, and then they all went quiet when she walked past.

Aged twelve she has learned something that I didn't learn til I was 50.  That remarkably few people will stand up for you, however much they like you, against someone they perceive as powerful.  I was utterly devastated by the discovery.  Beloved Daughter will be much better prepared.

Since the really big girl in her year left, BD now weighs the most in her year group. She is taller than the boy in question.  

We went to look in the mirror together, and I explained the concept of body dismorphia. "We are about the same fat, or not fat, aren't we?" I said to her as we gazed at our joint reflections, "only you're without the tummy."  We are both statuesque, strong, robust people. Like Princess Diana might naturally have been initially.  My father was the President of the Boats at Cambridge. BD and I would make good rowers, like her two stunning, willowy, 6' cousins who both rowed at Women's Henley last weekend. BD agreed.

"Let's sing 'Feed the Birds'," I then suggested.  She did so with enormous zest, while I accompanied her on the piano, with as much exhuberance as Liberace, but more mistakes.  "Sing the low G, like it says, not the high one," I shouted at her over the din.  She couldn't quite reach it.  Her voice is not low enough.  Just lower than the boy in question's.

The next day she was due to perform one of the only solos: 'Let It Go', from the animated film 'Frozen' on her flute, in front of all her friends at the School Summer Concert. "You are truly going to Let It Go tonight," I announced.  "You are going to get on that stage and knock'em dead.  Are you allowed to wear mascara?"

"No," she replied.

"OK, put some on so it doesn't show too much," I ordered her.  We tried on her old and new school uniform, and opted for the old one which is a little tighter, and she rolled up the kilt an inch or two (the one good thing about the imminent merger with the school across the river is that its uniform might be a little more flattering to all the little girls.) "And buy some new white socks!" I shouted after her, as she got out of the car, ready to face her day.

X was already planning to do the return trip from London (4 1/2 hrs each way) and Granny (84) from Dorset (2 hrs - her driving - each way), just to hear BD's four minutes of fame. How loved is that little girl?

The school dealt with the incident first thing, reporting back to me, and by evening, my beautiful, dazzling blonde Beloved Daughter was up on that stage with the widest smile lighting up her pretty face from ear to ear.  She remembered to close her eyes during the last crescendo of Let It Go and we all went home for supper kindly cooked by X before he left for London, probably to arrive at two in the morning.

So, many thanks from BD to that nasty, short little boy with the high pitched voice. First, the Summer School Concert, next, The World!

So with three internet dating sites on the go, everything's going a bit mad. Possibly bad and dangerous to know as well. I'm having a bit of trouble keeping up, but I think I'm still on top of things, just.  And anyway - after this sudden peak, I am fairly sure all will suddenly disappear and there will be nothing left, within days.  But at the moment things are quite exciting!

The other night a chap of 41 who lived locally, and was so utterly drop dead gorgeous that he gave me butterflies, contacted me.  I got back to him, and he turned out to be Sheikh from Leicestershire who had used a picture of a male model instead of himself, and completed an entirely fictitious profile, including describing himself as 'white/Caucasion'.  Well what is the point of that? But I felt a bit spooked.

A day later an equally delicious young man of 34, Italian this time, contacted me, and looking at the pictures, he really is from Plymouth. But - now what? He's not brilliant at English and I can't imagine what we would talk about, or how he would make me laugh.  I think he must be some kind of gigolo, but that is my suspicious mind.

Several of them write so utterly beautifully that you think they must speak like that too.  And then they don't. Quite a lot of them look defeated and sad, even though everybody bangs on about how happy they are in their profiles.  They're all also after honesty apparently.  I bet if honesty really hit them in the face they'd run a mile.  All the beaches that allow dogs must be packed out by lonely hearts enjoying what they love best.  'I'm just a normal guy' doesn't do much to sell anyone to someone like me.  'who enjoys the good things in life like eating out, going to the cinema and theatre, as well as cosy nights in by the fire' drone on the cliche-packed profiles.

So far everybody I've come across on the internet seems to have some kind of major drawback. Usually they are too old (I thought 60 should be my top limit - that's pretty old), too small, too fat, too bald, too glass half empty, or too boring.  Annoyingly, I am also becoming increasingly convinced that it will only work for me with a private school person. Not that I'm particularly snobbish, but because ours is a little world of its own, where everybody has an automatic understanding of each other. So that cuts out a mere 95% of the human race.  

What does unite everybody that I have met is that they all, bar one or two, appear to be extremely nice, decent, well-intentioned people.  Just like anyone that you might meet on the street really.  Which they are, if you think about it!

And my guess is that if the really made me smile, giggle and laugh with uncontrollable mirth, any other concerns might well go straight out of the window.

So if it's inevitable that you must be flawed in some way if you're internet dating, what's my problem, you may well ask.  Well it's obvious isn't it?  I am surrounded by sheep.

This morning I looked like one of those characters in a cartoon where water streams out of its eyes in a gush.

I don't remember ever crying so hard - not ever. Except when our first dog died, when I was seven.

Last month I poisoned Twiglet, our wonder-dog, by giving him an ibuprofen after Kind Neighbours' dogs attacked and hurt him.  £450, hundreds of pills and four weeks later, he is now as good as new, no thanks to me.  

Today I poisoned my horse.  With rat poison.

She was crashing around the stable, dripping all over with sweat, 'lip curling, rolling on her sides, scraping her front hooves on the concrete, gasping.

In a way I am relieved that I can still feel, and so hard.  I was beginning to think that I had become a bit emotionless, but clearly it's all still latent. I don't know how actors can portray that amount of sheer grief unless they have felt it themselves, and it's taken me til I'm 54.

I rang the vet four times: "Hurry hurry hurry hurry" I sobbed.  I got the picnic stool out and sat near adorable Vegas, gasping "I'm so sorry," to her, over and over and over again and stroking her wet neck.

Gradually she quietened.  I wondered whether she would shortly lie down and die.

After an hour I heard Vivian's car finally arriving, and she came in and took Vegas' heartbeat and listened to her gut.

"Clinically she's perfectly OK," she commented.

Vegas had barged through a blocked door into a small section of the barn which had two small trays of rat poison on the ground, and had clearly panicked as she couldn't turn around to get out again.  She must have eventually backed out in fright.

On close inspection we found it difficult to believe Vegas had actually eaten any of the poison - it didn't look disturbed - and Vivian said that the behaviour I described wouldn't have been caused by rat poison.  By now Vegas had started eating her hay.  Vivian said she thought the incident had been colic induced by stress, and gave Vegas a jab to calm her stomach.

She seems to be fine now.  Just like Twiglet.

So there we are. What a morning.  I feel very odd. And not very proud of myself.  Beware of your Mama, pets.