In the wake of the divorce referendum, media reports have alleged (correctly as it happens) that I voted in favour… and will do so again in the parliamentary vote.

So today at Mass during his homily, the archpriest pointedly directs his barbs straight at me. At one point he glares at me and spits out the somewhat corrupted aphorism: “Let he who is with sin… get hit by the first stone.”

At least that’s what Anġelika informs me. I’m afraid I nodded off after the first few minutes and missed it.

Monday

I’m rapidly getting the hang of the routine at my new post as the Parliamentary Secretary for Creative Indolence at the Ministry for Lethargy.

Whenever a major problem presents itself, I call a meeting of all my top civil servants and we thoroughly debate the issue concerned. After which I take the final decision to do… absolutely nothing about it. My civil servants love me.

Tuesday

As Anġelika’s ‘lump’ increases in size, so do the visits by the dreaded kunjata. She hasn’t actually moved in with us full-time… yet, but I fear that day is fast approaching.

This evening I pay a visit to the one place I know she won’t be: her own home – and take a whisky with my father-in-law. To my complaints about the omnipresence of his wife in my house, he is unsympathetic.

He snorts: “Ha! How do you think I feel? I’ve lived with her for nearly 30 years; it’s time some other poor bugger took her off my hands for a while.” Gee, thanks a bunch.

Wednesday

For the umpteenth time since May 28 I am telephoned by a journalist and asked how I intend to vote when Parliament debates the divorce Bill. He actually calls me on my private mobile. (How did he get the unlisted number?)

I give him the usual mantra I’ve repeated every time the question has been asked: “I shall vote or not vote… according to my conscience.”

But this hack persists: “So does that mean you’re a yes man?”

Me… a yes man? Never! I am my own man and I’ll prove it by voting positively and abstaining… so there!

Thursday

The confounded divorce question is touching everyone.

This evening I go to my mother’s with my laundry and to get a meal (Anġelika is now apparently too delicate to either operate a washing machine or a cooker).

Mummy tells me: “I’m worried about your father, he seems terminally depressed since that dreadful divorce referendum. He refuses to believe that our Sliema district could ever vote in favour of something so totally alien to decent people’s values. It’s a shame you no longer vote in this district; we could have done with all the No votes we could get.”

Er, yes Mummy… whatever you say.

Friday

Since no one else will volunteer I am despatched to represent the government at the Malta International Festival of Jazz. Music I know absolutely nothing about, but I’m willing to learn.

Unfortunately I mess up badly when – after sitting for 10 minutes through a discordant cacophony, I remark to the organiser that it seems to take an age for the musicians to tune up.

He replies coldly: “They are not tuning up, they are playing modern jazz.” Ah, right. See, I told you I knew nothing about jazz.

Saturday

I always feel that high summer is a very inconsiderate time for someone to die, provoking unseemly haste in their dispatch. Well, yesterday my ghastly great aunt Muriel shuffled off her mortal coil, so this afternoon I pick up my parents and we hasten to the Addolorata chapel for her funeral Mass.

I must admit I certainly didn’t recognise the paragon of righteousness eulogised by the presiding priest – and neither did my parents.

Father, whose aunt she was, had always thought her: “A mean, spiteful old cow.” And mother never forgave her for her wedding present to her and father: a second-hand vacuum cleaner that never worked.

Yet on and on went the priest, praising her hitherto unknown good works for charity, her piety, and so on and so forth...

Oops, sorry, wrong funeral… Great auntie is next up… or should that be down.