I DIDN’T WANT to celebrate my fortieth birthday. Not because I wasn’t happy about being forty; I don’t mind getting older. I’ve always been older than my years anyway. My mam said I even acted old and grumpy when I was a baby. Apparently I learnt to frown before I could walk and didn’t like having a dummy, as it got in the way of me tutting. I suppose losing my hair made me feel older too. I had a head like a wind-beaten dandelion by the time I had reached twenty-two. I don’t think stress was to blame for the baldness; it was the extra-strong ‘power shower’ my dad had bought off a mate and installed himself. It was way too powerful. Taking a shower was like doing a task in an episode of Total Wipeout. But being bald didn’t bother me, as my hair wasn’t that good anyway. Fine, flimsy stuff it was, that my barber described as the ‘hair of a Chinaman’, so I could never have had a trendy style. Wet-look hair gel was all the rage in England in the early 80s, after Michael Jackson made it popular. It was to help mould your hair, whilst making it look like you’d just stepped out of the shower. But it was never a big seller in Manchester as everybody had the wet look anyway due to the continuous, pissing-down rain.

      ‘I just want to stay in and have a chilli con carne,’ I told Suzanne.

      ‘But it’s your fortieth birthday. A few people have asked what we’re doing!’

      ‘Well, tell them I’m staying in, having chilli con carne. They can celebrate my birthday without me if they want.’

      ‘That’s just stupid,’ she said.

      ‘No, it’s not. People do it every year with Jesus’s birthday.’

      The good thing with her asking meant that at least there wasn’t going to be a surprise party for me. If there is one thing that I don’t like it’s a surprise, and she knows it. If you want to know another thing I don’t like, it’s fuss. I can’t be doing with people making a fuss of me. The first time it happened was when I started work. I was on a training scheme at a printing company and the boss bought a cake and called me to the kitchen. As I opened the door, they all sang ‘Happy Birthday’, which must be one of the most boring songs ever written. It follows you right through your life.