Rebecca Tyrrel

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

For most of the time I suppress my deep and painful longing for a cottage in the country. And I shouldn't complain, because the minute Louis breaks up from school we are in the car and off to a holiday rental in deepest, verdant, lush, green, cool countryside.

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Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 5 May 2008

If, when Matthew appeared at breakfast a fortnight ago, he had been wearing the kind of zip-up PVC balaclava that Frank Bough liked to relax in when he wasn't presenting Nationwide, I would have been less surprised than I was by his actual headgear.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 28 April 2008

In the 17 years that Matthew and I have been shackled together, as he puts it, in wedlock, we have argued over the following subjects: cooking; cleaning; childcare; tone of voice; the garden; the garden furniture; whether the tortoises (we now have two) are bothered by the bass beat of the radio; and Matthew's insistence on buying but then never consuming Tesco's coffee and walnut cake.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 21 April 2008

When the lack of broadband, internet poker and access to news of the Obama/Clinton battle finally overwhelmed Matthew, he fled our Devon holiday cottage for London.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 14 April 2008

In Devon, where we holiday, celebrity sightings are extremely rare, and for me this is a good thing. This is because in London every trip to a public place carries with it the risk of a chance encounter with fame, and Matthew gets overexcited at the possibility of causing me crippling social humiliation.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 31 March 2008

I made quite a simple and, I thought, innocent suggestion recently, but it didn't go down terribly well. Matthew gave me his "shall I call the psychiatric hospital now or leave it until themorning when it will be easier to sedate you" look. And then he said, "How can you even think of such a thing? I would rather gouge out an eyeball and eat it on toast with a sprinkling of Tabasco than not have our traditional tea in Devon for Louis' birthday. We have been having that tea for 10 years now and we will go on having it for another 10 years and another 10 years after that."

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 24 March 2008

My brother Noel called a while ago with some news that I immediately relayed to Matthew, who was playing internet poker in his office. "You won't believe it," I puffed, out of breath from racing up the path, "but Noel's found him!"

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 17 March 2008

Recently, Matthew and I had a most impassioned and philosophical argument. We were watching Wacky Races, and it occurred to us that Dick Dastardly's repeated but always thwarted attempts at victory were a marvellous metaphor for life. "How very philosophical and impassioned we are being," I said. "Oh yes," replied Matthew, "We are the Plato and Socrates of our age." And then the Arkansas Chutterbug performed a manoeuvre of such breathtaking audacity in overtaking both Penelope Pitstop and Professor Pat Pending, that it was only once the race had ended that we were able to continue the debate.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 10 March 2008

I didn't think it would ever end. Nor did I think that I would be the instigator. Could I have predicted the pain? I doubt it. You don't think about these things when you first get together.

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 3 March 2008

Matthew is proud of his astounding reservoir of knowledge when it comes to British television character actors. There are few that he can't name, he even knows other parts they have played and, worryingly I find, he can sometimes tell you what an actor has got up to when he or she has been "resting".

Rebecca Tyrrel: Days Like Those

Monday, 25 February 2008

Although Matthew is a man of the most unrelenting personal fastidiousness – spending anything up to three hours a day bathing – he has never actually cleaned anything else in the house other than himself (unless you count his meerschaum pipe, which he once suggested putting in the dishwasher).

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