Tap and unwrap..yeah, right....

So I am prepared to leave work, on Tuesday, drive home, finish packing and get a cab to the station to get the train to Bristol. In the morning however, I speak to a certain person on the phone who tells me he will be driving from North Yorkshire to St Albans, by mid day and he will happily give me a lift to the station. Fine.

About half past one he rings to say he left later than planned, (surprise) but will be back by three thirty latest, he just has a half hour conference call from 4 to 4.30 but will be in plenty of time to take me to the station. Hmmmm. I say, if I haven't heard from you by 20 to 5 I will call a cab, otherwise I will miss my train. Fine, he says.

I leave work, finish packing, make sure I have all my paperwork for court, driving licence, train tickets, and realise I am starting to get quite stressed about the whole thing. It's an added stress worrying about catching trains and crossing London and catching connections....

Anyway, half past four come and goes, twenty to five comes and goes and by now I am stressed and fuming, I really don't need this kind of support. In desperation I ring his mobile and he answers, saying cheerily, 'I am on my way!' I slam the phone down and five minutes later am still stood on the pavement with my bag and at ten to five he arrives. 'Hello,' he says happily getting out the car.

'I said if I didn't hear from you by 20 to 5 I would call a cab. How did I know you were even back from Yorkshire?'

'Well I am, I finished my conference call just after 4.30 and here I am, what's the problem?'

Screaming mad lady: 'Yes, but I didn't know that. If you don't let me know how am I supposed to know you're not f*****ing late as usual? I really don't need the stress.'

So we drive to the station in silence, me trying to calm down, him wondering what he has done wrong exactly. 'Sorry' he says quietly. Then, 'I bought you a chocolate orange to eat on the train .' Damn.

So anyway, the chocolate orange story. I put it safely in my bag, where it stayed til I got on the Bristol train at Paddington. I sat by the window, opposite a lady and then a man sat next to me. (Note..we were all doing Sudokus. How sad is that!) I had a bottle of water and my chocolate orange. That would do nicely until 7.30pm when the lovely Caroline would meet me and we would go out for dinner.

I quietly unwrapped the orange. Mmmm it smelt good. It was also slightly warm and therefore kind of stuck together. I tried to prise a segment or two apart with my fingers. Failed. Got slightly sticky. Tapped orange lightly on chair arm. Failed. Tapped harder. My fellow travellers looked at me. I popped the orange back in its paper and returned it to my handbag, not wishing to look desperate. The journey continued. I could smell the chocolate. After a while I got it out again and had another go. Solid as. Rummaged frantically in my bag, hunting for a nail file. Nothing. Put orange away again. It doesn't matter, I'll be there in a hour, I can wait.

Time passes. The chocolate orange smells amazing. I start to get a panic attack. I have chocolate with me I can't eat. It's torture. I consider sending abuse text messages to David, this is all his fault, why can't he just buy me a large bar of dairy milk? No, he has to be bloody clever and buy a chocolate orange.

I consider my options. I'll stand up and ask everyone in the carriage if they have a pen knife. I'll ask the man to move, squeeze out and walk six carriages to the buffet car and get a knife. I take the orange out and look at it. I consider if I can just try and cram it into my mouth in one go, will the lady opposite notice? The man gets off at Swindon.

I get the orange out once again and this time I can't wait. There is a tiny hole in the top where the segments meet. I get a roller ball pen out my bag, take the top off, and stab the orange with the point. I stab again. The pen sticks into the orange. I put it on the table and bang it down..and miracle, the pen is forced into the orange and a couple of segments come away. They go into my mouth...just the two...

Later that night I offer Caroline a piece of chocolate orange from the half that is left. 'You only ate half on the train?' she says. 'I am so proud of you, what willpower.'

'But Caroline,' I say, 'I only opened it five minutes outside Bristol...'