flossing the cat

Did I tell you the one about the werewolf, the cul-de-sac in suburbia, and the courting couple? Well, the story starts one weekday evening, back in the Eighties, with my mother furiously attempting to rid the lounge window of the coating of dust produced by the crematorium opposite. “Ych a fi” she says, her face like a cat's bum. “No self-respect.” I follow her gaze to the lay-by outside the cemetery gates, where two teenagers are busy sucking each other’s faces off in the front seat of a green Ford Cortina. I am almost fourteen at the time – but my experience of open mouth kissing is limited to the time Great Auntie Maud launched her tongue into my mouth thinking I was her dead husband, the great big lezzer - so  I lean into the window to get a better view. “They’re only snogging”, I conclude. For my mother, however, there is no such thing as “only snogging”. Snogging involves EXACTLY the same level of risk as eating your dinner straight off the toilet seats ...