Today Angelika and I - and only Angelika and I - escape for lunch a deux. The kunjata is only too happy to baby-sit Annabelle at her place.
We eat at the Grand Hotel Septicaemia in St Paul's Bay, but... it's only a qualified success. Angelika seems to suddenly suffer something of a bladder problem, since - all through the meal - she keeps leaving the table to visit the ladies room.
I'm a bit concerned, but when we pick up Annabelle from the mother-in-law's later she tells Angelika: "There was no need to keep ringing me every five minutes, the child was perfectly safe with me." Ah!
Monday
Lunch at Phoenicia with an old friend from my university law course. He's serving as a Euro MP and seems to have prospered somewhat. When I tell him so, he replies: "Yup!
And if I were you I'd try to get a transfer to the EU Parliament; it pays much better and the expense account is practically bottomless. And the all-expenses-paid freebie 'fact-finding missions' to exotic countries, staying in the best hotels, is an added perk."
Hmm. I wonder if a transfer window does exist, I'd swap Valletta for Brussels any day.
Tuesday
My new-ish secretary Bettina is doing just fine. Although her telephone manner needs polishing and her shorthand isn't, she's decidedly more decorative than the last version. I'm even rather enjoying the fact that one paragraph of dictation takes 15 minutes.
She's so petite and attractive she fits snugly beside me in my tiny office. And it helps my concentration to be this close to a work colleague. But I must remember to be careful, since this morning Angelika asked me why I'd stopped complaining that my office was too small.
Wednesday
Part of my remit as Parliamentary Secretary for Fooling Some of the People Some of the Time entails meeting, greeting, wining and occasionally dining obscure foreign diplomats and politicians.
Today my minister details me to look after some minor Brazilian politician, here on a 'fact-finding' mission.
The Brazilian turns out to be a drop-dead gorgeous woman of about 30. I'm salivating all the way back to the ministry, where I bring her for a meeting with my minister. When I do, he tells me to get lost, since he is going to take over. He didn't say that when I showed up with the octogenarian deputy foreign minister of Kazakhstan last week. Strange.
Thursday
This morning I have an important meeting with my minister and our top civil servants to formulate a completely new policy document for the Ministry for Obfuscation. I spend days preparing my version, and everybody present has an input.
Later, when the perm sec brings me the new document I fail to see what's new about it. Apart from a few commas it looks exactly the same as the old policy document. And when I query him about this, he agrees.
So why did we go to all that trouble to formulate a much-publicised new version? He sighs and says: "It's what's known as politics actually." Ah... right.
Friday
Although it's some three years before the next election - and since I only got into parliament after the 19th count, I decide to shorten the odds in my favour for 2013.
Today I hold my first ever clinic in my village's party każin. But when I turn up at the prescribed time of 2.30 p.m. prompt... I am greeted by just one constituent, an old lady who demands that I prescribe her a more effective laxative. She thinks it's a medical clinic. I sometimes wonder why I bother.
Saturday
This evening Angelika and I attend the wedding of a law student from my year. It's a rather strange affair. He is a 36-year-old lawyer, but his 'bride' is a lady of some 58 summers. The attraction is beyond me.
But, as I whisper to Angelika while the bride totters down the aisle, at least he's not marrying her because he's got her pregnant. Angelika replies: "These days I wouldn't be so sure about that." She's not... is she?