Louise Rennison_Georgia Nicolson 04 by Dancing in My Nuddy Pants

bottom–free zone and I was just about to ignore him when he went off.
    Ah well. C’est la guerre , as they say here, although what the railway station has to do with anything, I don’t know. (Or is that gâre ? Oh, I don’t know. As I say to Madame Slack, French is a foreign language to me.)
    five minutes later
    The gorgey French boy came back and brought me a red rose!! He said, “For the most beeootiful girl,” kissed my hand and then went off into the crowd.
    Honestly.
    The ace gang were dead impressed. We discussed it for ages. It didn’t fit into the snogging scale anywhere. And it wasn’t a “see you later.” Was I supposed to follow him? Should I have done something erotic with the rose?
    As I have said with huge wisdomosity many times, boys the world over are a bloody mystery.
    au revoir
    We got on the train and said “Auf Wiedersehen” to the city of romance. We have our memories to take home with us. More importantly, we also have our HUGE comedy berets.
    We found them in a souvenir shop in the station that sold musical Eiffel Towers, nuddy-pants cancan dancers and other sophisticated gifts. The berets are gigantic and they are wired around the rim, so that they stick out about a foot from your head. They are quite hilarious in the extreme. We each got one. I can’t wait to wear them to school. They make the lunchpack berets seem traditional by comparison.
    When we got on the train, Madame Slack went off to the teachers’ compartment, probably to chat with Gorgey Henri about handbags they had known and loved. We took the opportunity to try on our new berets. All six of us leaned out of our carriage window wearing our gigantic berets as the train pulled out. We were yelling “ AU REVOIR , PARIS! WE LOVE YOU ALL!!!”
    And guess what? The people on the platform all waved and cheered. They were shouting, “Bonne chance!” I think.
    I asked Jas, as we tucked into our cheesy snacks for the journey, “Do you think that the French-type people think we really like our berets?”
    She said, “No, I think they think we are English people and therefore not normal.”
    â€œHow could they think that?” asked Rosie.
    Then I noticed that Rosie was wearing a false mustache as well as her beret.
    on the ferry heading home
    Uneventful trip home because we had a normal captain (i.e., English).
    Also we had chips. A LOT.
    I was quite overcome when we saw the white cliffs of Dover, until I realized we weren’t going to Dover and they are just some crappy old white cliffs of somewhere else.
    midnight
    Arrived home to my loving family. As I came up the drive, Angus shot over the wall and gave me a playful bite on the ankle as he passed. I opened the door and yelled, “ C’est moi! Your daughter is home again, crack open the fatted calf and—”
    Angus had pushed his way in first and Dad started yelling. “Get that bloody cat out! This house is full of fleas.”
    I said sternly to Angus, “Angus, stay out of the house, it is full of fleas!” But the Loonleader didn’t think it was funny. Even though it was.
    12:10 a.m.
    Libby was pleased to see me, at least. She woke up when I came in and said, “Heggo, Gingey.”
    She made me a card with a drawing of a cat band on the front. Angus is the lead singer, although why he is upside down, I don’t know. The audience is little mice and voles in disco wear.
    By the time I had unpacked my bag, Libby had fallen back to sleep in my bed with her “fwends.” She is so lovely when she is sleeping, and I gave her a kiss on her cheek. I wonder how I will get on without her when I go to America. It made me feel a bit weepy, actually. I must have boat lag.
    Just as I was dropping off into snoozeland, Mutti came in. I think she might have had a couple of glasses of vino tinto , because she looked a bit flushed.
    â€œHello darling, welcome back. How was