Sometimes things happen which part of me thinks are too embarrassing for me to record here, yet I feel compelled to do so because it is so amusing, or to teach myself a lesson. A good example of this would be what happened yesterday. It was Boxing Day of course, and my brother Luke, his wife Yan and my little nephew Elias came to visit me and our parents in Harlesden. We were all going to have Boxing Day lunch together.

To be honest I was feeling rather pleased with myself: I had gone to the same shop at the o2 where I got my “Make America Think Again” baseball cap and bought Luke and Yan caps with the word mummy and daddy in Chinese on them. Of course, neither I nor the lady helping me at the shop knew a word of Chinese, so I had asked her to type the words Mummy and Daddy into google translate. I thought I was being clever and multicultural.

Luke, Yan and adorable baby Elias arrived at around one yesterday. Naturally, the opening of presents was quite high on the agenda, and I was very eager to see what they would say about my gifts. I expected a mixture of shock and amusement. As soon as she caught sight of the cap I had got for her, however, Yan looked rather confused, as though something didn’t make sense. Luke’s “Daddy” hat was fine, but not Yan’s.

A few seconds passed, and then Yan made the connection. The cap said mummy, but it was the wrong kind of mummy. Total fool that I am, I had given her a cap with the Chinese word for the ancient Egyptian embalmed pharaohs written across it’s front!

When my sister in law told me this, I curled up into a ball in a strange combination of total hilarity and utter embarrassment. Only I can make such mistakes. Obviously everyone else found it just as funny, reassuring me that it was the thought which counts. Even so, I suppose it will teach me not to try to be so clever!