Sometimes you reach your lowest ebb before you make your greatest discovery. So it was the day I burnt my bottom on the hot tap of the shower. The day started like any other: I was wrenched from a deep, dreamless sleep by impatient morons hooting their car horn on the street beneath my balcony. They do it to attract the attention of a shopkeeper and it drives me wild. Unlike most days the disturbance was not accompanied by foul-mouthed abuse from my angelic wife or a sleepy yell from my two children.
Somehow, miracle of miracles, they had slept through it. My senses, awoken as much as my body by the hooting, detected no murmurings from the infant cribs and I could see Mrs Milner sleeping beside me. Now, anybody that knows me would tell you I am a doting husband and father who would take this as an opportunity to prepare a hearty breakfast for the flock. This is, of course, utter nonsense but try as I might I could not get back to sleep so I reluctantly dragged myself out of bed.
On the bright side a quick cup of tea and a bit of sport on TV before chaos and Teletubbies take over is always nice. But there was no milk in the fridge. If my kids were just a little bit older I’d happily shake them awake and send them down to the shops for supplies but it doesn’t seem fair for a two year old. I would do this myself. Unless, of course, I let my principles slide and do something I always said I would never do. Stuck to the front door of my fridge is a leaflet from the local grocery. It has been there since the day I moved in. Free delivery 24 hours a day.
But I couldn’t succumb to this laziness. The shop is in the same building. All I have to do is go down in the lift and it is right there outside my front door. Calling up and demanding they bring me Dhs3.5 worth of milk would mean admitting defeat and slipping into the sedentary, spoilt Dubai lifestyle I’ve always bemoaned in other people. I’d be no better than the hooters.This is not the final days of the Roman Empire – extravagance does not rule my life.
Proud of my get up and go attitude I stepped into the shower. Perhaps I was too jaunty, perhaps I was too sleepy, perhaps I deserved it but seconds later I was screaming in agony. This, in turn woke my youngest son, who woke up his brother, who woke up his mother, who treated me to the fountain of abuse I’d been denied earlier. So I gave in and called the number. But maybe ordering groceries isn’t so bad. Going yourself is such a pain in the behind.
