Life is sometimes not like the movies

I've just been watching a clip on Potty Diaries, which shows David Beckham sprinting, swimming, jumping fences, kicking footballs as he charges through his neighbourhood in pursuit of Victoria and the kids in their car. You know, apart from the car (silver VW instead of black Range Rover), that could've been a glimpse into our lives. If I ever drive away with something in the car that Husband needs, that is EXACTLY what it looks like here. Oh, and except Husband doesn't wear H&M underwear.

But life isn't always like the movies.

In the run up to Christmas, I did a fair amount of browsing and shopping on Amazon. So did Husband. I spotted an email that a dvd had been despatched: Season Two of Modern Family. What? You haven't discovered Modern Family yet. Ah... you're in for a treat (though Season One is better than Season Two, in my opinion).

"Oooh, goodie!" I thought. "What a brilliant present. Good on you, Husband. I'll enjoy that. We'll enjoy that together."

Christmas came and went, and no Modern Family dvd was unwrapped. Hm. Unfortunately, I'd made a joke to someone earlier on, about how I'd pretended I hadn't seen the email confirming despatch of the dvd, but that it had better turn up on Christmas Day, otherwise it would be like that bit in Love, Actually. You know. The bit where Alan Rickman buys a heart pendant necklace, which his wife Emma Thompson assumes is for her, but then it doesn't turn up on Christmas Day, and she knows it must have been for someone else. So I'd joked about that, and then... the dvd didn't turn upon Christmas Day.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking I was quite safe. I mean, heart pendant necklace is one thing. Modern Family dvd is another. You have a point. It doesn't smack of steamy affair with nymph-like seductress, does it? However, it was a mystery.

I challenged Husband. "What happened to the Modern Family dvd you ordered for me? I saw the email from Amazon."

"What dvd? I didn't order a Modern Family dvd?"

Let's cut a long story short here, and I'll tell you what had happened. I had ordered the dvd myself. I remembered, with prompting from the Amazon "order history", that I'd been putting together an order of several presents, in a hurry. I'd mused and pondered over whether to buy the Modern Family dvd for Husband. I went back and forth, add-to-basket-delete-from-basket-add-to-basket-delete-from-basket, on the basis that it was too obviously a present for him that I wanted myself. I thought I'd finally decided not to buy it, but in fact, I had done.

That didn't happen to Emma Thompson, did it? Script writers don't bother with plot denouments as unglamorous as memory slippage. It would sound a bit unlikely. "Oh, I ordered it, and then thought I hadn't ordered it, and that you must have ordered it." And boring. Not dramatic enough for a film.

I like that episode in Love, Actually. It stops the film from being too totally mawkish and soppy about love. And I'm also glad that my life was boring and undramatic and unfilm-like on this particular occasion, because forgetting what you've ordered online in a busy week before Christmas, though a little embarrassing, is better than the alternatives.

There is a twist in the tail, though. When I asked Husband where the dvd was, he denied all knowledge of it. We worked out, given the despatch date in the email and our travels over the Christmas period, that it had never arrived. So I contacted Amazon, and they sent another. (Though, sshhhh, just between you and me, I can't help wondering if it did in fact arrive, and if I will find it, in years to come, hidden away in a safe place, along with one or two other surprise Christmas presents.)

.