The Champagne Incident

Before Alistair and I toddled off to Cyprus, he asked the ex if she wanted to house-sit. (Oh, yes, regardless of what may or may not have happened, she is still around). She agreed, and said she would mind the kinky B&B too. I usually do this job. It's pretty straight forward... you do everything you would if you were preparing a regular hotel room. Make it clean and beautiful before the guests arrive, and then in the morning, go deal with the carnage. Although, I have to say the guests are usually very clean, and very tidy.

The ex did not show up to mind the house. In fact, it seems that the only times she was there was to prepare the B&B, and for the dinner party she threw in our absence, (we'll come to this later).

The guests arrived on the Friday evening. Alistair got a call on Saturday afternoon. I am not sure whether it was from the guests, or from the brand new Mistress who has never rented our dungeon-space, but was due to on the Saturday afternoon. In any case, Alistair had misunderstood the amount of time the guests wanted. They wanted the whole weekend. Alistair had only booked them in for Friday night, and the new Mistress had booked a session in with a client on Saturday. Of course, all of this could have been discovered before any real damage was done. Had the ex been there, instead of fucking off to a party, she would have gone down in the morning to discover the guests still there. She could then have offered for them to relax upstairs whilst the new Mistress had her session, and then they could have returned back to a nice, clean, ready to go B&B. (The guests would not have minded this, because they are regulars and friends). Instead, what happened was the Mistress walked in on the guests, and was understandably angry. She cancelled her appointments, and Alistair lost the money from them. The guests did not return for the full weekend, and Alistair lost substantial money there, too.

Still, bless the ex, she can't do much wrong in Alistair's eyes. If only she had received the text message he sent her in time, she could have rushed wastedly back to the house from the party across London. All would have been well.

The ex had also agreed to pick us up from the airport. We were due to land at 2.30am. During the course of our last day in Cyprus, we get a little message informing us that there had been a big party in Brighton, which had gone on for ages, and she might not be in any condition to drive, and due to highness, no sleep had been possible. I knew instantly we were going to be stranded at the airport. It was of no surprise when we then received a message telling us that no one would be coming to fetch us. I blinked in disbelief when Alistair tried to blame the situation on the fact that there was a party in Brighton. Indeed. How dare our mutual friends throw a party, and tempt the ex away from fulfilling her promise of a lift from the airport. Frankly I wouldn't have minded half as much, if it was during the day. We could have caught a train. Instead we had to arrange for an expensive cab.

But, bless her, it's not her fault.

When arrived home, I scanned the kitched. Imagine my delight as I discovered that I would have the privilege of clearing up yet another of her dinner parties. In fact, I do believe that I have cleared up at least the previous five parties she has had, even the ones I did not attend.

And lo, I would get to feel even more special, for what is that brown substance all over the bath? It is professional wax from the professional waxing kit, and it has set, and it may only be removed with solvent. A real treat.

Lucky, lucky me.

And lucky, lucky her. Use Alistair's house to host a party whilst we are away, and not actually bother to give anything back at all. Even if it means stranding us at the airport at 2.30am.

Yesterday, I set about clearing the kitchen. As I looked at the line of bottles by the bin, I saw an empty bottle of Tattinger Champagne. My eyes narrowed in suspicion. I had bought one of those for Alstair on his birthday... we were saving it to drink together. Before I even opened the refrigerator, I already knew it had been drunk. I got a bit shouty.

This is rare for me.

However, rather than see my (I think rather fair) point of view that all this was just a bit too fucking out of order, Alistair thought I was grossly over-reacting, and was only upset because I have a chip on my shoulder about the ex. Hmmmm. Well, he could be right, but let's just re-cap this page of events, just in case. I'll let you all decide for yourselves, shall I?

So angry.

You get him on a good day, and it has to be very, very, very good, and Alistair will admit that he defends the ex when often he really shouldn't. Mostly, just like now, he smiles a little smile, and says she's been a bit naughty.

He did mention the Champagne to her on the phone, and the state of the kitchen. After the conversation, I asked if she had at least apologised. He said no. This did not seem to bother him. Moreover, she had blamed the birthday Champagne on mutual friends who had raided the fridge. So her guests at her party had drunk my birthday present to Alistair. This seemed to make it a bit more ok for my absolutely bumfuck-crazy beloved. Apparently the ex has said she'll replace it. Watch this space, but please, oh please, don't hold your breaths.

Midnight Snorkelling

As you know, I have been learning to scuba dive. As soon as I had completed my first dive, I immediately enquired as to whether it would be possible to dive at night. After all, think of all the nocturnal creatures that could be seen at night. Think how much more alien an already alien environment would seem.

Sadly, you need a few lessons, and to have completed a few more dives to dive at night. I have only had time for two, plus a skills session in a villa pool.

However, I was determined to have a taster of the night sea, and so I suggested to Alistair that we might go for a night snorkel, armed with diving lights. We went to St George's Bay, which is only up to 5 metres deep at some points, and enclosed by rocks, which form a nice barrier from the crashing waves of the open sea.

It was an experience I highly recommed. We swam under a new moon, and the sea was warm. Slowly, we shone our torches across the sea bed, rocks, and nooks. Hovering throughout the water were thousands of little fry, fast asleep, seemingly to young to be woken or bothered by our lights. The glare from our torches illuminated their transparent bodies, and I thought they looked rather like tiny ghosts. And then down below, in a deeper section of the pool, we saw something I thought I'd never see. There beneath us was a huge conch shell, presumably housing a very large hermit crab. It must have been 8 or 9 inches across, and was the kind of thing most people only ever see decorating people's bathrooms. I also discovered that sea-slugs, or sea-cucumbers come out at night. They really do look like large, fat cucumbers, and though I couldn't, I had a strong desire to squish one in my hands to see what it would feel like. Fire-worms also like the night-time. We saw an astonishling large one. One mustn't touch these. Ouch. However, if you disturb the water a few inches in front of them, they ripple. At one point, we shone our torches towards the surface, whether at day or night, this is often a good idea, as you'd be surprised how many fish lurk near the surface, and are rendered almost invisible because of it. We disturbed a large shoal of fish, old enough to panic, and their bodies darted and flurried in all directions, but I quickly called a stop to this, as I am not in the business of frightening creatures needlessly.

We swam for an hour or so, then made our way up the sandy beach. Our bags had been left beside sunbeds and sunshades that had been deserted for the night. The only noise were the sounds of breaking waves, and the buzzing of crickets in the distance. Alistair reached into our bag, and pulled out the largest towel. As we stood beneath the moon and all the stars, he took the largest towel from our bag, pulled me in, and wrapped it round us both. I nuzzled into his soft neck, still slippery with sea-water. And then he lifted my chin, looked into my eyes, told me how much he loved me, and kissed me. And it was one of those perfect kisses, long, lingering. And it was one of those moments where you feel as if you could almost breathe in the soul of the other person.

Except for one minor detail. When we climbed onto the beach, we made our way to our bags. Alistair pulled out the largest towel and pulled me in close. He asked if I had had a nice swim, and if I thought it had been romantic. I said yes (although that was more in reference to what was to come, rather than the swim itself, because we had been underwater with tubes, and focusing on trying to find interesting animals...) I kissed him, but he ensured it was short, and more like a peck. I kissed his neck, and made my way up to his mouth. I attempted to gently coax the kiss I wanted. I failed. I masked my disappointment and suggested we dress. He asked me why I was so eager to do so, so I told him that he did not seem particularly taken with my kisses, so we should get ready. He said something about snogging being inappropriate in such a public setting. I looked around, but there was no one else in sight, and the distant windows and balconies of hotel rooms were so far away that binoculars would be needed to see us. And what the hell is wrong with one snog in public at the beach under the stars?