Win vouchers to spend at any Tesco store

Competition No 3724

Set by John O'Byrne on 25 March

Rachel Cooke, in her NS review of Sabine Durrant's "chick lit" novel, suggested a new genre - "twi lit", for the HRT generation. We asked for extracts.

Report by Ms de Meaner

The "twi" was fine. It was the "lit" that puzzled some of you. An hon mensh to David Silverman for Bridget and Adrian Mole: the Ovaltine years. £20 to the winners. The overall winner is Will Bellenger, who also gets the vouchers.

I'd eaten enough isoflavones to kick ass down at the grandmother and toddler boot sale. My urine was hot enough to make an old geisha gush. I stayed in just long enough to spit at the pantyliner ads, and headed down to get tickets for the new tribute band. The Balder Eagles had been pretty sensational, but Neil Old and Crazy Dobbin looked like they could knock surgical stockings off Jefferson Big Bus.

Perce insisted on coming over with me. We had to stop ten times on the way. Prostate calls (Prostate is his dog, a tired old terrier - rather like Perce, in fact). "Would you like to come down to my allotment and see the size of my leeks?" he asked. I clipped him round the head with a full jar of Clarin's.

It was turning into a dry hair day. The boys at the launderama were struggling to fold their sheets, and I had to show them how to do it again. Thirtysomethings. They wouldn't know a good time if it bit them. I know that, because I bit three. The grocer said he was fresh out of eggs. "Me, too, buster," I riposted, and fondled his rhubarb.

Will Bellenger

Lydia's Logbook

Monday: A wonderful evening. Worked late with the new accountant. His cerulean eyes' merest flicker melts my knees. At least my libido's not wrinkled. Now Geoffrey has run off with his lap-dancer, I feel restless. The chairman came in as I was leaving and asked if I'd care to dine with him. These millionaires! Think everyone will fall in with their wishes. I mean: tanned and distinguished - hardly today's look. "I've washing to do," I told him.

Tuesday: Weightwatchers. Have gained four pounds. Millicent from Sales was there - the smug beanpole. She says dieting has cured her cellulite. But what if you've only got celluheavy? Cosmetic surgery? Should I try Botox first or go straight for the tummy-tuck and facelift?

Wednesday: Can't wait for surgery. The new accountant looked straight through me. Invisible older woman syndrome. Little does he realise the degree of our intimacy in my dreams. The night sweats are worth it. Popped into John Lewis's looking for eye-catching clothes. No luck. Most women of my age are divorcing their third husband. Will Zoe teach me estuary English?

Thursday: The chairman calls. Do I like opera? Only with soap, I tell him . . .

M E Ault

Who is that man? He seems so self-possessed, so in control. His eyes are intense, so dark a brown they are almost black, truth-seeking eyes. That nose, patrician, straight and delicately pinched, above a mouth that invites soft lips to coax and relax, to release the tensions, unleash a passion; a little cruel, perhaps, but willing to yield, to be complicit, to share secrets, moisture, sweet obscenities even. And his hands; long fingers, girlish almost, well-shaped thumbs, neat nails, holding a glass of wine that he sips while looking around the room, seeking a kindred spirit, someone like me, perhaps, a meeting of like minds and bodies. His eyes meet mine. I look away, pretend an intimacy with my companion that I hope will tease and intrigue, dare him to draw closer and stake a claim, recognise the gifts I offer. I tremble. I need a drink to calm me down, to quell my nerves. I feel his gaze lingering on me.

Bugger. My incontinence pantyliner has just come adrift. Must dash to the loo. Hope he's still there when I get back . . .

Gudrun Hansen

Grey Mondays are hard enough without bathroom mirror-images challenging the greyness outside. Worse still, realising the squat tub of age-defying emulsion, purchased only last week, is already spent. Or was it last month? This cannot be accurately recalled; mental note made to scribe the purchase date on the lid of the next. Breaking news for manufacturers of co-enzyme Q-10: it ain't makin' it.

Sunday flight back from Madeira not soul-enhancing. Eminently doable a decade ago, next time will be a Friday flight to allow recuperation. It turned out to be a "snuff" holiday - truly atrocious. Perhaps to be expected that some of us would slip off the dish. Logical in terms of probability. More holidays, more cash, more chance of a massive myocardial infarction.

Cash is back. Plastic is so mortgager. Among unfeasible Christmas gifts, a gem, a retro purse-cum-wallet. Half-moon shaped, it folds into a full circle, exposing a chasm that disgorges coin of the realm. With a nudge of glucosamine-empowered knuckles, silver becomes quicksilver as it trickles across the opposing tray affair, accompanied (usually) by chondroitin caplets. They barely gleam in the penumbra: the Gotterdammerung of minted coinage, Q-10 potentialities and life. Years of scrabbling for exact change

stretch before me. I'm immortal again.

John Griffiths-Colby

No 3727 Set by Margaret Rogers

"Articulate male of philosophical bent WLTM an honest, sincere female soulmate of discretion to share the finer things of life, possibly more. Elsinore area." Try writing up to four for famous political or literary characters.

Max 50 words per ad by 26 April (to appear in our issue dated 6 May) E-mail: comp@newstatesman.co.uk

Post your comment

Please note: you will need to login or register before you can comment on the website