Yesterday was Valentine’s Day – a day hated by those without anyone, who are looking for love; a day treasured by those in a loving relationship; and for those married, just another day.

I am in the “loving relationship” category, although I am sure both Claire would agree with me that it’ll be “just another day” after 10 years of marriage!

As it was Valentine’s Day and I was feeling romantic, I was willing to try some new things – two, in fact. Not in a Fifty Shades of Grey kind of way, involving whips, handcuffs and goodness knows what else. No, my adventurous side is far tamer.

When it comes to drinking alcohol, I have cider. I’ll also try beers and lager. If you offered me a Smirnoff Ice, I wouldn’t chuck it back at you either. Wine, however, is a no-no.

Claire has forced me to drink wine in the past and I have given her sips of Thatcher’s Gold and Sheppys. Both of us reacted as if we had been given a glass of urine.

Last night though, I was feeling romantic, so bravely took on a small bottle of pink cava. I have to say, it was nice – very nice, in fact. Does that make me a wine drinker? I now feel I should try and find a house with a cellar, and import thousands of bottles of the stuff, drink it my the bucket-load, including with lunch, yet deny I’m an alcoholic, telling people instead I’m a connoisseur. That’s what all wine drinkers do, right?

I must add, the wine was drank alongside a lovely meal (yes, it was from Marks and Spencer), consisting of vegetable bake, cheese croquettes, chocolate tart and lots of strawberries.

After the meal, we sat down on the sofa and tried the second new thing. While in town on Thursday, I was drawn into HMV by massive posters for a new romantic comedy, available on DVD. The film was called About Time. A rom-com. Something I don’t do.

I think the last rom-com I watched was Notting Hill. This was back in 1999, when I got a brand spanking new DVD player. DVD was new technology back then and you couldn’t buy many films on that format. I seem to recall visiting Our Price (now deceased), and buying The Matrix along with Notting Hill for something like £30, which was a great deal at the time, especially for a teenager with a student loan burning a hole in his pocket.

Notting Hill was impressive on DVD, but I would have enjoyed watching Manchester United The Movie, such was my admiration for the DVD quality.

To cut a rambling story short, I had not properly watched a rom-com since.

I did enjoy the film. It was basically about a man who could travel back in time to put right things he messed up or wished he did differently. Cue him falling in love, getting married, having children, saving his alcoholic sister and visiting his dead father to play ping pong. I did question Claire why he didn’t go and buy a lottery ticket. This was lightly addressed in the film, in something of a cop-out excuse. Crickey, this is turning into a film review!

As a side note, we suffered a bit of a scare in the evening. As everyone in Britain will know, there have been fucking storms for what seems like forever. I honestly can’t remember the last time it didn’t rain in Bath, I really can’t! Anyway, we were happily watching the rom-com, when we heard a bang. My instinctive reaction was to yell “what the fuck was that?”Despite the fright, my bowels didn’t loosen to the extent that I soiled myself, although had I been greedier with the strawberries, we could have had a messy accident on our hands.

The porch was investigated for the cause of the disturbance. We found nothing. I told Claire not to go outside. Despite my fear and avoidance of horror movies, I’ve seen enough to know what can happen in this situation! We then traced where we believed the source of the clatter to have come from – the boiler cupboard. Claire tried to open the door. It was stuck fast. I tried and it opened with ease. Now I’m not Mr Muscle, far from it, so how the fuck did it open first time for me, but not Claire? And what was that bang? Whatever it was, it shat me up. Any more strange goings on and I know who to call…