So Mondays exam went ok, I think... Gotta wait till August for the results - felt so odd to be back in an exam room! Got another, the calc paper tomorrow which I've found harder but we'll see.

I forgot in my update the other day to tell you THE biggest news you are likely to hear. Actually I'm not sure you'd care but its BIG to us.

Have I told you guys about how I fell out with MH? We've not spoken for like a year now. I'd been bottling up for ages some horrid, careless comments she'd made to me in the past (a check through the archives - cos I am THAT bored reveals I mentioned some of them but not all)

Yeah, let me just give you a run through cos fuck it, she was supposed to be one of my best friends and it still hurts.

Ok *hazy flashback scene*

My Dad's been diagnosed as terminally ill, what would you say to your supposed best friend at this time, when I told her my plans to return home to look after him and maybe get a part time shop job to help out.

You certainly wouldnt tell them that "they were just going home to avoid reality, that there was no need for them to return to London and that they should move to Sheffield with you, or that there was no point you finishing your degree if all you're gonna do is work in a shop."

Gee, thanks for the support there....

Anyway there was hundreds of other snide comments like that, about my Mum's accident after Dad died, how again I was using that for an excuse to avoid real life... She certainly never cared that my Granddad was diagnosed with cancer (all clear now thank God!) and ignored that.
Yet like a mug I kept quiet, I supported her when she decided that it was more fun to sleep and seduce married men, how she miscarried a child by one of them and then when the shit hit the fan how she blamed everyone but herself. She told me I should leave my job in the museum, and Welshy just so she could have a housemate (albeit an unemployed one) in Derby.

Eventually I grew a backbone and told her to fuck off, over an entirely different incident, when she blamed me for everyone in her church finding out about her antics.

That was a year ago and I still get vague updates about her life as we have mutual friends, CL for one. I still kinda worry about her as I'm a fucking softie. I've heard crazy rumours about how she got involved with another man (unmarried) who then proceeded to take all her savings and leave her penniless. About 4 jobs that she's lost in the 2 or 3 years that followed her Masters, through unprofessional conduct and child safety issues (although nothing seems so bad that she can't then get another job or lose her Police Check record)
This resulted in her being unable to get another job in Derby, and having to move to Northampton at the start of this year. (From what I've heard she blames everyone else for this, for losing all her jobs).
I think she has another Family Visitor type job there, or runs a children centre depending on who you talk to.
I dunno, I cant help but worry that some of these rumours are true, and I know i'm down here (and shouldnt care!) so stories do get embellished. 7 years of friendship was a hard thing to throw away for me and I do still worry.

Anyway... Two weeks ago The Lizard hits me with this bombshell
"Do you know that MH is preggers and its a sperm donor!"

So yeah. She's decided that at 29, she's verging on the menopause(!) and needs a kid. So she's entered the world of single parenthood and dont get me wrong, I think anyone who breeds and ends up being the solitary carer is pretty heroic. but why would you take the clean and clinical decision to do it that way? I'm all for independence but that just seems madness to me
(Or is my lack of maternal instinct showing?)
She's not exactly in her 40's (although CL seems to think that her doctor told her it was now or never as her body was failing... I dunno, I know she's lied to her in the past)
And the sperm donor? Well apparently she asked a friend to do it, so its not even like going hrough the NHS.
How do you explain that to your child? How do you make that decision? How do you go through your list of male friends and then broach the subject? I'm fascinated by how she went about the process. Did she sleep with him or use a turkey baster and how often did this happen?
If you cant even afford to live yourself how do you expect to support a kid?

Its all beyond me. But now I'm feeling kinda old! There's only E and The Lizard out of my admittedly small group of female friends that aint married or preggers. At least the boys aint letting me down! Am I the only one who still wants to get drunk rather than married or pregnant?
And am I wrong for being really concerned for MH and the child (due in December) considering all the wank she's done to me or is this just a new 21st century way of doing things and i'm just old-fashioned?