Friends following me on Facebook already know of this week's woes.
A week last Saturday, we moved our man-child, Grizz, into his student accommodation for the commencement of Freshers' Week.
This is where they drink themselves through half their student loan, eat nothing but toast for a fortnight, and cavort about as if they were at a Bacchanalian orgy.
That I managed this without turning into a sniveling wreck is to my absolute credit. Of course, the fact that he's really not that far from home, and studying in the city where I work, is the reason why.
Mind you, we've had a number of run-arounds with Grizz this week. Thank the Goddess that he moved no further from home than thirty miles!
1. I rang him on Monday morning. Just to ensure he was up in time to catch the shuttle bus to get to his very first lecture. He was just about to leave his digs. Wonderful.
He rang GJ an hour or so later. He'd over-shot his bus-stop and didn't know where he was in the city. Unable to describe his surroundings, GJ was unable to tell him where he might be. He set off at marching pace in the direction he'd come in, now late for his lecture.
He texted GJ half an hour later to say he was standing outside of a filled lecture theatre, frightened to go in. My husband's text to him might have turned the airwaves blue.
So, not only was he late for his lecture, he couldn't find the University building.
He's only a Geography Student, FFS!
2. I rang him on Thursday, just to ensure he was up in time for his field trip. He was.
He texted my husband an hour or so later, to ask where Hadrian's Wall was.
Repeat the refrain, "He's only studying Geography, FFS!"
And we live in Northumberland, so there's no excuse for him not knowing the county's history!
3. I was about to ring him on Friday, when he rang me in the office in a panic.
"Mum, where's my boxers?!"
As I hadn't really been with him all week, this was an impossible call for me to make. I started to fret. If he was down to his last set of boxer shorts, how would he fare?
It turns out that, in spite of my constant nagging for him to do this all summer, he hadn't taken enough supplies, like underwear, with him from home, where they are breeding like rabbits... And he had ignored the bubbles of washing liquid I left him with, so he WAS down to his last pair of undercrackers...
My lovely, sweet colleague, a long-suffering Vicar's wife, parent to happy, healthy children in their twenties, and still relatively sane, talked me down from the roof.
"What's the worst thing that can happen, Fhina?
Is he naked out on the streets of Newcastle?
No.
If he isn't, there's not a problem.
If he is, the Police will put him in a cell, then at least he's got a bed for the night!
Stop fretting. He'll survive. He's got to learn..."
I know she's always right. I am grateful to her, always.
Could someone pass me a tranquillizer, please?
