A visit to Gilbert and George’s pizzeria (Belle)

An unlikely group of us had been gathered together in the east London home of artists Gilbert and George. For many years I had made no secret of my loathing of their work yet now I found myself charmed by both of them – and their home. The eclectic collection of beautiful and amusing objects was exactly what I was trying to achieve in my own home.

Gilbert and George kept a pet pig who had once competed at Crufts disguised as a dog. The yellow winner’s rosette was displayed in the downstairs cloakroom.

Over the course of a long dinner our hosts kept gently moving guests and items on the dinner table until I glanced in the mirror and was astonished to see that they had used the dinner party guests to re-create a living tableau of The Last Supper. What an amazing, transitory, act of creative genius! And no-one else had spotted it. I jumped up and cheered enthusiastically. From now on, as far as I was concerned, Gilbert and George were the bee’s knees.

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Rousse tries – and fails – to relax

Belle knew that I had been overworking so she invited me to her hospital where I could take a few hours away from my computer. The catch was that I had to do this incognito and in silence. Creeping around the operating theatres really was not my style, and the only way that I could keep my mouth shut in the staff room was to cosy up on a sofa next to Belle with a copy of Take a break.

It was not long before I was drawn back to work. I’d already been fretting about my next conference keynote and my anxiety levels rose even further when I sat under a table at the front of the auditorium listening to first speaker. I concluded that they must have all the time in the world at the Oxford Internet Institute: this guy was delivering his entire speech in verse.

In another attempt to relax I visited my sister J and her family in the beautiful south. There’d been a few more changes to her house: a stone sign to direct walkers off their land and onto the railway path, and a strange contraption that looked like a cross between an upturned bath and an oven had taken the place of the front door. It was now extremely difficult to get into the house and I wondered if our mother would ever be able to stay there again. Somehow I managed to negotiate entry. I then headed straight upstairs to raid J’s wardrobe and came away with a shocking pink denim skirt and a matching mohair bolero cardigan.

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Nobody is impressed by Rousse’s recent awards

I picked up two more awards: one for my skilful canoeing and another for exemplary pedestrian behaviour. However TPR, RG and BM took little notice. Although it was a beautiful day, they refused to spare even half an hour to come with me to the enormous beach to celebrate.

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The select committee comes calling (Belle)

As I opened the front door to leave home, three women were standing on the doorstep, blocking my exit. Holding clipboards and briefcases they marched past me and went into my office, firing questions about my filing and invoicing processes.

The women were humourless and intimidating and even the sight of my dog walking on his back legs into the office holding a tray of tea and custard creams failed to make them smile. I was in big trouble.

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Harry Potter almost messes up Rousse’s travel plans to Kings Cross

It was Harry Potter’s fault that I almost missed the 08:30 service from Edinburgh Waverley to London Kings Cross. We hadn’t appreciated just how long it would take to organise refunds on the 40 cinema tickets for Harry Potter and the deathly hallows part 2 for the children who now could not make it. Nor had we realised that our purchase of so many tickets in the first place would be so fascinating for the box office staff.

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Belle and Lennie Henry

Although I hadn’t realised I was being interviewed for the position, I discovered I been the best candidate and I was now Lennie Henry’s new girlfriend. In what I had thought was nothing more than a casual conversation in a lift, it seemed my answer to ‘what do you like to eat?’ had won him over.

(Lancashire hotpot and lamb cobbler).

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Time-travelling Rousse wins lottery jackpot

I watched the sequence of events very carefully. To the right of the stone wall a brand new white Sunseeker was being launched into the sea. My attention, however, focused to the left. Here a busy crowd gathered around a swimming pool. A man pushed through a gate at the top and placed a 50p piece on the wall. Someone else picked the coin up and popped it into a stone post about 10 feet away. A banner dropped and announced the winner of the £117 million pound lottery jackpot. I watched the sequence again and prepared to enter the fray. I was on a mission for millions!

The crush of the crowd was much worse than I anticipated and I became very uncomfortable waiting for the man to come through the gate. I was just about to give up when the creak of the hinges signalled the start of the sequence. The man walked over to the wall, just as I had observed. Before anyone else had the chance, I negotiated my way through the mass of bodies to the wall to collect my quarry. It turned out not to be a coin, but a key. I grabbed it then crossed back again to the post where it fitted the slot perfectly. The banner came down and I was a multi-millionaire. I spent the rest of the afternoon in the pool.

It was only when I watched everything back later on the black and white CCTV images that I started to feel immense shame at cheating the system with my privileged access to time travel.

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A mention of Morrissey and Rousse recruits (another) Facebook stalker

Newly-wed SL (was SJ) sang the praises of my husband to an audience that included her mother and me. I budged uncomfortably in my seat, taking care not to ram it into the table behind me. I’d already been told off for accidentally doing this a couple of times. Everyone believed that TPR and I enjoyed a perfect relationship, but they missed all the complaints of my errant behaviour and taunts over my lack of fitness.

Only that morning in the park an incident had the potential to lead to more trouble. First I joined a game of rounders in deep field where, it has to be admitted, I was hopeless.

I then got caught up with a neo-Nazi team of overweight Sunday morning footballers. As the players actively ignored a Jewish man’s request to participate in the match, in the grass I found a clutch of rusting 1980s music badges, including one for the Smiths.

Their owner turned out to be a tall, skinny, red-haired myopic lad in his mid-twenties. When I told him that I’d seen Morrissey recently he gathered me into his arms and danced me round the playing fields.

After a polite goodbye I headed back to SL’s house. Doubtless I had just recruited yet another Facebook stalker.

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How to do well in REF: check your soap bag (Rousse)

Without full details of how to submit to the Research Excellence Framework, UK university staff had two broad options: (1) to guess the requirements and work towards them; (2) or to ignore the whole exercise until the actual criteria were published. Nobody could account for the enthusiasm for a third approach that was spreading fast across academia: male colleagues raiding the contents of female professors’ soap bags. One day, while I was out hunting for wedding dresses, a secret mission from the University of Sheffield was apprehended in my office rifling through some of my most personal belongings.

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Bathrooms à deux (Rousse)

I was back at University looking for the bathrooms. After exploring the entire ground floor at last I found one but was stopped from entering by the sign on the door. This bathroom was NOT for use by single people.

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