I've just returned from a really brilliant three days on the lovely island of Mallorca with my DH, sans child. There is simply no way that I am disclosing the name of the place where we stayed, because it is a small slice of heaven, and it is hard enough to get a room there at the best of times, and anywhere where they anticipate your need for a frozen strawberry daiquiri even when you didn't realise you actually needed one yet is a place worth keeping under wraps. Having been to Mallorca an unnatural amount of times already, my first times were few. But we did go, for the first time, to a really stunning new restaurant called Simply Fosh.

Simply Fosh is run by a chef called Marc Fosh, who is actually British but lives on Mallorca and cooks the most simple gorgeous food in extremely trendy surroundings - art installation? - got it. Located in an old convent - you got it. Posh ex pats fawning around - indeed. Marc Fosh himself welcoming you as you arrive - you guessed it. But despite all these attempts at uber-coolness, none of this can disguise the fact that it is a truly wonderful restaurant. My lemon cream dukka with rosewater sorbet sounded like a show-off-piece-de-2 star Michelin-resistance tat. It was in fact the best dessert I've ever had. And we got the last bus home, just to prove that we're not too posh after all.

Simply Fosh, at Hotel Convent de la Missio, Palma.

Hello my all-too-hot lovelies. For the first time ever, I have decided that I hate hot weather in London. Now, I know this means I am officially getting old. I have no desire to run off to the park and strip down to my underwear and sit in the sun (and I'll have you know that for someone who's 36 and has had a kid I look mighty fine in my underwear, so that's not why), and the truth is that there's nothing about central London and sun together, in the same place, which really works. This hatred also has nothing to do with the fact that I have to work in it, as I work in a fully air-conditioned office. it has everything to do with the fact that it is http://www.just.too.hot.com/ (don't check that, it is fully made up and may link you to a dodgy site). I also have a real issue with women who wear flip flops in central London. What? This isn't Ibiza, love. It's the mean streets. And your pasty feet look fat and swollen. And men who sport sunburn (and I don't care if you have been playing Wimbledon all week, mate) - what is that about? Attractive.

Anyway, I am off to Mallorca this weekend and the sunshine there will of course be excellent. But that is because there is (a) a beach (b) lots of outside cafes and (c) lots of outdoor pools, oh and also the fact that holidays + sun = good old time. London + sun = horrid sweaty mess. Urgh.

This weekend, for the first time, I attended a World Cup Final! It was the final of the Cricket Twenty-Twenty World Cup at Lord's Cricket Ground. Now (stop sniggering at the back) this was a truly great occasion. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, here's the lowdown.

• Cricket is a game invented by the English. The players usually wear white and traditionally games take days and spectators sit around drinking Pimms and eating sandwiches.


• It's played with a bat and a ball and it's all about scoring runs (and not getting out).


• The English used to be the best in the world at cricket (when they were the only ones that played). As soon as they shared it with the world, lots of other teams became better than us. Teams who are better than us include Australia, Pakistan, the West Indies, India, and lots of others. Teams who are worse than us generally have no history of playing cricket, see the Netherlands, Outer Mongolia and so on.


• Recently, cricket officials started to realise that not that many people have time to come and watch a game which takes an average of five days to complete. So they invented 20-20 cricket, which involved each side having only 20 "overs" to bowl (each over has six balls. Are you keeping up? Quiz later). This means that the whole game is only 3 hours long approx. and can be very exciting as there is real pressure to score high quickly.


• Very recently for the first time, they decided to have a 20-20 World Cup every 2 years. This year it was hosted by the UK.


• The two finalists were Pakistan and Sri Lanka. England went out miserably at the 'Super 8' stage, despite a 'brave' (rubbish) performance.


• The key player for Pakistan is a man called Shahid Afridi, who in Pakistan is bigger than David Beckham. The man next to me almost fainted when he came out onto the field, and held up a banner which said "Be Afridi, Be Very Afridi", which was a clear work of genius.

To cut a long story short, it was wonderful. We sat in the Pakistan end and the atmosphere was electric. Even I was waving a Pakistan flag at the end (and yes, they did win, and Afridi scored the winning runs). All around us, whole families, grannies, toddlers, you name it had come out to support their team. It was like being at a game in downtown Karachi.

Apologies for the delay in blogging, it's just been really busy out there in the real world, DH has been away in the States so spare time didn't really exist... but here I am. And today my first time report is really close to my heart. For the first time, I am really conversing with my first born.

Before I actually had a child, the image I had in my mind was of a small child, walking along, holding my hand, pointings things out and having a conversation with me. I think I'd blanked out in my head all the really difficult bits before that: giving birth, having a small baby to look after when you have no idea what to do and so on. But yesterday I realised that the dream has finally come true, after George (who obviously is terribly advanced) started speaking in real sentences. Yesterday, I went to get him up out of his cot and he said: "Mummy, I come out and Mummy change nappy please, it's dirty" - I was really floored, certainly no room for misunderstandings there. And yesterday we spent a good hour in the garden while he pointed out to me a garden fork ("Garden, Mummy, not eating"), asked me all about the tap and hosepipe and pointed out a whole series of raindrops on the leaves. And then last night: "Mummy, play Yeah Yeah Yeahs" (I know, perfect musical taste as well).

I know that it's not de rigeur to post about your children, as I'm sure it's terribly boring for everyone else. But let me indulge in this. For the first time, the Mummy-dream has come true.

On Friday night, two first times - first time to the Electric Ballroom, to see The Horrors for the first time. Quite a novelty this one, as I have no idea how I could have missed going to the Electric Ballroom before - I go to so many gigs and it just so happens that I've never been there. And what a fabulous venue it is too - small but perfectly formed.

Oh... and that's not even taking into account the wonder of The Horrors. Now, for those of you who have no idea who these boys are, they are an indie goth band who have an enigmatic lead singer called Faris Rotter, who had suffered the ignomy of being Peaches Geldof's other half when she announced that she had gotten married (to someone else). Anyway their music is an acquired taste (I described it to someone as music where the tune and lead vocal appears to be being drowned out by someone doing some loud vacuuming in the background) but in my view, this makes them God-like - a limited fan base means no chance of appearing on an arena tour any time soon.

We rocked up and found ourselves in a crowd of small teenage goths, but we were much admired (me for my T-shirt - 80s B Line Matchbox Disaster) and DH for just being gorgeous, I presume - the girls were very private-school-from-Skins.

Anyway, they came on stage and cue lots of high-pitched girly screaming: "Faris! Faris!" while Faris (who appears to have gotten over Peaches) stood in his beanpole way and waved his arms around and lit his face from underneath to look super-scary. They were all dressed in black (save for someone who looked spookily like Jade Goody's husband on bass guitar and was wearing a Hawaian shirt) and they were sell-your-granny fabulous. 'Who Can Say' is a song which makes me and DH argue a lot (are the lyrics teenage or not? - They are, and I am clearly right) but makes me want to give up life, as if a 20 year old can write this stuff then what hope is there for the rest of us? And when it started up, the crowd almost fell silent in anticipation. Genius.

Overall, not the violent gig the press had predicted, but worth every not-being-like-a-lawyer-for-a-whole-night moment. I am a Horror.

Horrors new album (Primary Colours) out now.

So, on Thursday for the first time, I attended a ballet class. Now, this is not actually true. I took ballet classes from the age of 5 to about 10. However, that still means that I haven't been to ballet class for 25 years and given the fear I felt as I walked in, it counts as a first time (my blog, my rules, my friend). I thought I had chosen well - an adult evening ballet class for beginners. Note that word, it will become important. OK, so fair enough it was at a well-known ballet school near my home, but nevertheless, an adult beginners ballet class. Does that scream tiny girls in white tights and pointe shoes to you? No, exactly. So imagine my horror as I turned up, in a pair of sweat pants and a rather ugly t-shirt (printed with 'Royal Mail Letters' for some reason), to find the class absolutely full of those young women, plus a token few young men, all attired with tights, leotards and ballet slippers, all limbering up at the barre, looking like they were about to audition for Bambi or Swan Lake or something. I immediately walked out, backwards, and walked into Helen, my new friend and the only other person who was in socks and not wearing tights. She assured me that we were in the right class - she'd been once before - and we stood skulking at the back watching all the Margot Fonteyns showing off (well, just stretching at that stage, but you know what I mean).

Eventually, I plucked up the courage to speak to the rather formidable guy beside me and said (accusingly, you bet) "You don't look like a beginner to me!" to which he replied - "oh, we're not, we just love the teacher." Hm. Anyway, you're probably expecting me to say that I'm never going back, but you'd be wrong. I loved every moment (well, except one, which I'll explain in a moment) and I can't wait to go back.

So the teacher then arrived, and all I can say is that he is the weirdest yet most inspiring teacher in the world. I felt like I'd stepped into a parallel universe. Earlier in the day I had been at my desk being a lawyer and then here I was, practicising demi-pliées in fifth position, whilst having my rib cage position corrected by an Italian man who spent the class coming out with phrases like: "Close your ribcage until you feel like you will suffocate! You won't suffocate, you won't die. Remember when your husband left you and you felt like you would die? Well, you didn't did you?" I was enchanted.

Helen and I lumbered about at the back for two hours whilst watching the stars (pretty much everyone except us) until towards the end of the class, he shouted "Beginners, at the front!" and made us stand in front of the mirrors. I thought he hadn't noticed us, and I genuinely almost walked out. But instead I lumbered about while he watched us, until he dismissed us with a mysterious: "Not bad, you know more than you think you do". I can't wait for next Thursday.

Well, quite an eye-opener today, first timers. Today for the first time, I sat the Life in the UK Test. For those of you who are (rather fortunately) blissfully unaware of what this experience is all about, quite recently the UK decided to introduce a new test which must be taken by anyone who wishes to become a British national, which is, as its name suggests, all about Life in the UK. This is merely a pre-requisite, you also have to put in a lengthy application and (if successful) you attend a citizenship ceremony, where you swear allegiance to the Queen* (*coughs into hand).

Now rather foolishly, despite having been in the UK for over 30 years, I have never applied for British nationality at a time when it was rather easier, cheaper and had no requirement to sit any test, but recently I decided that if I was good enough to pay tax in this country and represent the Government regularly in court then frankly I'm good enough to have a British passport. So I booked my test and bought my book to swot up for the exam.

And so the fun started. Now, unfortunately I have signed an agreement with the Home Office which forbids me to discuss the content of the test. But what I can say is: oh my goodness me. Despite the fact that ultimately I completed the test in 6 minutes, I had to learn a massive amount of things I did not know. So, avoiding any questions I actually had during the test, or how they are phrased - do you know what percentage of the population described themselves as Buddhist duirng the 2001 census? Did you know the year in which the voting age became 18? Or the number of countries in the Commonwealth? Or why the Huguemots came to the UK and when? Exactly. Last night when I realised how hard it was (having left myself one night to revise) I sweated. A lot.

But hey, the good news is that I passed! Hurray, one step closer to swearing allegiance. And I met a charming Jamaican lady who was taking the test at the same time as me (she failed, sadly). But the bad news ...now I actually have to make the application, pay £700, send in my passport and wait 6 months to know if I've been successful. Er, yes, this does mean not being able to travel for 6 months anywhere ... and they might lose it! Maybe post-summer holidays...