Difficult difficult lemon difficult.

Of my life so far, 78.26% of my life has been spent in education. But there is one valuable lesson they didn't teach me in school and that was how to fill in an Indian Visa.

For a start, I had no idea what my citizenship number was and then it kept asking me to name my spouse. I sat and mused this for a long time and tried to move on to the next question. But no, the boxes were obligatory and asterisked. For a good half a second, I wondered if the rules had changed. Perhaps they only let married couples to India for tourism now. If so, I had 8 days to find a suitable husband. Red in the face, swearing at the computer with smeared mascara at the stress of it all, this was going to be no mean feat. I may as well have been sporting a scrunchie. Only when a colleague helpfully pointed out that I had in fact accidentally stated that I was married, did it all make sense. Meanwhile, I had to faff around with the fact that my mother Jane, isn't really called Jane at all, which made me question my father's identity - had he also swapped his names round? - and further confused the issue when I had untick the bizarrely assumed fact that my grandparents were Pakistani. I can quote Tennyson verbatim, I can discuss the economic state of Madagascar in French and I can analyse and sing each instrument of Stravinsky's Firebird. I have now learnt, however, that I very much struggle to fill in a three page form.

And so I finally submitted the fucker. 

I then had to choose an appointment. Of which there were none.

Crap.

Deary me. Best ring up Fayesy J (my travelling buddy) and explain that we must arise at 6am (on her birthday) to queue at the Indian High Commission.

And so we did.

With cups of tea and muffins in tow, we queued up at the Indian High Commission. An hour later they opened the door. We had a lovely chat with the lady behind the counter. And now we must wait for a text (£1.20 for the privilege of text updates) for confirmation of visa readiness.

But it is Diwali this week.

So we must all cross our fingers.

p.s. I have not yet mentioned, that after a lot of faff with the travel agent (who shalt not be named) which arose after faff at my decision making skills (I tossed a coin to decide whether I should go - heads I go, tails I don't - landing on tails 5 times thus making me cross thus making my decision for me), Faye and I booked flights over the phone to each other. We filled in the forms and pressed submit on a countdown from three.

I received a lovely confirmation.

Faye received a less lovely rejection.

After more faff (the website people said they couldn't help, the airline said ring back in 5 hours), we finally got through to an Indian chap called "Charles" who booked Faye on the flight. She paid twenty quid extra.

Sucks to be her.

Having said that, she will no doubt now be in business class, with a generally better seat. For the price I paid so last minute, I'll defs be in cattle. Next to the loos. And a crying baby. And a nervous flyer.And someone who takes up more than one seat and impinges on my personal space and may cause DVT to my spindly frame.

Maybe I should ring Charles back and offer to pay an extra £20.

Oh well, at least those going from Heathrow won't have Delhi Belly.

Yet.