Irish Daily Mail - YOU

LIZ JONES’S DIARY

In which I delete David from my life

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I’ VE DELETED DAVID. Let me explain. After Smokinggat­e, and after his apology, I sent him this: ‘You don’t really have any plus points.’

He didn’t reply. Days went by. So I sent this: ‘Enjoy your fags. And your s***hole of a flat. Not nice, is it, when someone disrespect­s your home?’

‘I apologised. And, no, it’s not nice. Neither is it nice to have what I say in a private conversati­on printed for all to read.’

What now? He probably read at a minute past midnight on a Friday night a column about when he texted to beg me not to disclose his financial situation. I didn’t. I merely wrote that he has more money than I do, and yet he was still not going to contribute to the rent of a London house if we moved in together. His only input, other than to make a mess, would have been to ‘help out when I can’.

And so I have deleted him. His emails, his texts, everything. He can no longer contact me. I’m an enigma. I could have arsed around with ghosting, which apparently is when your ex thinks you are dating someone hotter. I think a clean break is the best thing. I’m sick of his whining. Of him spending months reading about me on Digital Spy. Get a hobby! Trim your eyebrows! Take up some form of exercise other than hunching over as if in a snowstorm to light yet another roll-up; he does this even indoors.

Anyway, enough of him. My more pressing problem is: where do I live? My friend offered me an ensuite bedroom in her house, but then she started to worry about my cats killing the blackbirds she feeds every morning in her garden. So I’ve been searching the internet. I finally found a really remote, one-bedroom cottage with a garden up for rent. It’s incredibly cheap. I arranged to see it. The cottage is deep in the Dales, off a really long, private lane. The views are stunning. Inside, it is literally two up, two down. It’s freezing. But my dogs will be able to walk off the lead. It’s miles from the nearest road.

But, having been stung once, living near a farm, and having learnt that if you do what you always did, you get what you always got, I made a point of walking to the nearest smallholdi­ng. I stood outside the front door for a bit, thinking, ‘ Blimey, what a magical place. This is perfect!’ A woman came to the door. She didn’t smile. ‘Sorry to disturb you,’ I said. ‘Why are you here?’ ‘I’ve come to see xxx cottage.’ ‘What business have you got going to the cottage?’

‘It’s up for rent. The young lady who lives there is moving to Darlington. She says it’s too cold.’ ‘This is private property.’ I’ve never met such a cold fish in all my life! I was polite, respectful, and all I got was an icy stare. What did she think I was about to do, steal the horse brasses? I think this explains why I’m not pining for my beautiful Georgian house overlookin­g the Swale. The farmer next door cast such a dark cloud over my home, I used to dread driving back. Would he be drunk? Would he have a ladder up to the cottage bedroom window? Would he be in my hallway? Would he be haring up and down the lane in a tractor at 60mph, lights blazing, at 2am?

Nic is still having problems, even though we moved away, and I lost a fortune in value off my house when I sold up. She was in Tesco in Catterick, then drove home to find out from her neighbours that the farmer had turned up in her village. A friend of his family who worked on the checkout had phoned to tell them Nic was shopping in Tesco with a man. The farmer was so enraged, he got in his Land Rover and sought her out. Isn’t it against company rules for staff to phone and gossip about customers?

I wish Countryfil­e would deal with all this – the reality of living in rural areas if you are female, single and have dogs – I really do.

He can no longer contact me. I’m an enigma. A clean break is the best thing

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