je n'aime pas La France, mais ce n'est pas une probleme; je t'aime, tous mes lecteurs Francais; je t'aime beacoup

Now my French isn't brilliant. What I mean here is that although I don't like France, it doesn't matter, because I love you, all of my French readers, I love you all so much. I may possibly have said I love all my French writing tables, which would be a mistake, but then again if you are one of my growing number of French readers (78 in the past week?!) and you're reading this in translation, you will, I hope, forgive me. I don't think of you as a writing table at all.

I only don't like France only because every single trip I have made there has precipitated some disaster or caused its own version of Nightmare on Rainbowgirl's Street. However calm, romantic and free I have tried to feel, I have always been so relieved to return to England.

For example, the disastrous trip to Paris when I was 16 with my school nearly ended up with me arrested in the Red Light District for having broken the 'dorm curfew', getting horribly drunk and pretending I was the jazz singer booked for the evening; I think I even took the stage and began to sing before I either was caught or collapsed with alcohol poisoning. I remember a school contemporary trying to take my contact lenses out for me while I screamed at her that if she made me go blind I would sue her but it wouldn't matter because I'd be blind anyway (she got them out, all credit to her).

And my last horrible, sad and degrading trip to France in the late summer of 2012 was with my High and Mighty Ex Partner Mr Sleezeball and our 5 collective children (only 2 are mine, I hasten to add, and thank the Lord above he is the father of neither), where I spent most of the trip sickening for the illness I have been stuck with ever since, whilst pandering to this stupid English man's every whim ('je voudrais un omelette pour mon mari') - husband just made me feel better, the word just made it seem less ridiculous to be dragging all these reluctant (and in his case, oversized) children around a French port looking for an omelette and a small amount of red wine for my soon-to-be-ex partner and his bleeding colitis, whilst feeling increasingly panicky and ill myself. (I'm sure if he had been French, he'd have been more of a gentleman).

Oh and I trod in some human faeces by the side of the road and managed to smash the hire car. Perhaps these were omens that everything was about to go wrong. France was the backdrop for these events - and many others which I shall keep to myself (except the Hornets. I have to mention the Hornets. If you're one of my lovely French readers, please find a way to deal with these. They terrify me more than anything else in this world, except hospitals).

Don't get me wrong. I have no problem with the French. Well, you're a bit superior aren't you, but then, you have a right to be, on the whole. It is not stupid that the French don't like the English. They have sense!! We English are not very nice!! We are really crazy!! Come on!! We don't even like each other; we are constantly battling each other in these ridiculous, ill-disguised social classes ( a bit like India, only we haven't really got extensive slums yet that you can see from your 5* hotels, although they're coming). Or do they do that all over Europe too? Well, we do it here, and it's idiotic. We compete with each other all the time, we have absolutely no table manners, and yes, we are dreadfully unsophisticated.

So if you are French, and reading my blog regularly, hello! I like you, automatically, because you have recognised that I have a little (tiny) bit more sophistication, imagination and style than your average English fool.

Or perhaps you are reading it thinking 'you crazy chavvy English single mother, get a fucking life!!'

In which case I say, Vive La France! Vive La Revolution! Le Roi Est Mort; Vive Le Roi!

I'm just amazed that anyone in France is interested in me. Amazed, flattered, and a little confused (ooooh ... perhaps THAT is where all my so-called 'friends' from pre-illness times have gone... maybe they're all living in a commune together slagging me off.... ok paranoia now, stop right there.)

So it's horrible invasive camera tests down my throat and up my bum this week at the same time; I am terrified. I've had both , but never at the same time. I rang the NHS 'nurses' for advice. Their 'advice' was follow the instructions, come in on the day, try not to worry. Ask any questions when you get here. England. See what I mean? This is why I hate hospitals even more than Hornets, though it is a close run thing.

So, it'll be laxative central here on Tuesday; by Friday I should be back to my 'normal', increasingly agoraphobic self, with little memory of the point of leaving the house for over half an hour except for some very specific purpose but hopefully with some idea of why I had two episodes of rectal bleeding.

Wish me luck. Or tell me to fuck off, in French if you like.

Whatever floats your boat, mes amis. Whatever floats your boat (so long as it's not a canal boat, in which case I have plenty more choice words for you and your scummy parasitical infected waters, but not in this post).