...Combine utter, polar disagreement on everything, ever, with the fact that I am a text-book Only Child, and she is a violent psychopath, and we're warming up. Then factor in my being English while she is German, which not only makes each one of us personally and absolutely responsible for the history, and the social and cultural mores of our respective countries, but also opens up a whole field of sub-arguments grounded in grammatical and semantic disputes and, well, just try saying anything and walking away.

Examples? Okey-dokey. We have argued about:

    * The way one should cut a Kiwi Fruit in half (along its length or across the middle).

    * Which way - the distances were identical - to drive round a circular bypass (this resulted in her kicking me in the head from the back seat as I drove along).

    * Whether her cutting our son's hair comes under 'money-saving skill' or 'therapy in the making'.

    * She wants to paint the living room yellow. I have not the words.

She keeps making me carry tampons around - 'Here, have these, just in case.'
'Oooooooh, why can't you carry them?'
'I've got no pockets.'
Then, of course, I forget about them. And the next time I'm meeting The Duchess of Kent or someone I pull a handkerchief out of my pocket and shower feminine hygiene products everywhere.