What's in the box?

The financial review continued last week, and I got a bit over-ambitious (which is by no means a rare thing for me). Having found a suitable extra-job (thankfully, it does not involve Scorpio Leisure), I piled on the hours and totalled it all up until it looked like I could pay off my mortgage in five years. However, I decided that I did want to live after all and scaled back considerably.

After having faced the prospect of being mortgage-free at the tender age of thirty (two), I now felt slightly depressed that I'd never be able to pull it off. I needed something to lift my spirits again - quickly. So I decided to buy a tortoise. How very retro.

A tortoise would be the perfect addition to my flat. I mulled it over. (I'm sure it would be quite independent and be happy doing its own thing, no hair means less fluff on my carpet, it could eat all the fruit and veg I never get round to (a live recycling machine if you will), it would casually wander through to join me as I sit writing, I'd come home from work and it'd be wandering around, it wouldn't make any noise. It would be very much like my wooden giraffe but somewhat more mobile - perfect.)

I discovered I could buy one online for a discounted price of £99. And free delivery - even better. I'd have to get it delivered to work (as I wouldn't want it being punted about the Royal Mail depot) but I quite liked the thought of everyone asking: "What's in the box?" And my response: "A tortoise." Whereupon I would indeed reveal a tortoise.

My mum was distinctly unimpressed. "You're not getting a tortoise," she said with an exasperated sigh. "I'm an adult, with my own property, you can't tell me I'm not getting one." "You're not getting a tortoise." "But I think it'd be really cool." "Why don't you wait until you have a big house, with a big garden." "When I have a big house with a big garden I'll get a horse. The whole point of the tortoise is its lack of need for space." "Well, we'll see - maybe Santa will bring you one." "Stop implying that you have any influence on this decision." It never ceases to amaze me how quickly I can regress to my four-year old self in certain conversations with my mum. A hideous image of me dressed up like Bette Davis in 'Whatever happened to Baby Jane?' flashed into my mind, and I made a mental note not to discuss my wackier notions with my parents.

I was explaining all this to some friends on Thursday night. I don't think any of them were really getting it. Sinead looked at me like she'd heard about as much as she could take and said: "I don't think you're in a fit state to have a pet ... hearing you talk about it being like a wooden thing that moves about."

"Don't worry," I said, "I'm not actually getting one. I found out that you need to buy a special tortoise table, a UV lamp and lots of 'natural' obstacles to place around your house in order to exercise the thing. That's a bit more complicated and messy than I'd originally thought. And also, I realised that it'd have to excrete all the leftover veg I fed it, so - again - more messy than I thought."

Hopefully though, my two jobs and my round-the-world trip will occupy me enough to keep me from ever actually buying livestock over the Internet.