This is my hand. It’s the hand of a 48-year-old divorcee. I wear no rings, in fact I rarely wear jewellery except for the plain gold hoops that keep my pierced ears from closing up. I LOVE “junk” jewellery and can be known to wear “dingle-whoppers” from my ears and lots of necklaces but that happens rarely these days because, well, they don’t really go with trackie pants and tatty tee-shirts do they?

Anyway, the point is that my hand is going to get itself a ring soon – a wedding ring. I will give one in return to DM.

Yep – he’s gone and asked me. He said that he couldn’t do it when I was earning the salary of a corporate whore and he was a struggling artist. Now we’re both as poor as church mice, he decided it’d be a good time to ask. Well, at least I know that he’s not after me for my money!

He’s been through a lot while I’ve been ill and I’m grateful and thrilled that we’ve come through it.

We’ve not yet set a date, but it will be this summer and it will be an exercise in how we can get married with a certain amount of flair and gusto, while keeping the cost to within £10. Well, I expect we may scrape up a bit more than a tenner but it certainly won’t be a wedding with an expensive frock (and certainly NOT a frock with no shoulders) or a reception in a castle.

I like to think I can weave some “Linda magic” to come up with something that meets our moral code about not participating in conspicuous consumption or excessive spending but still delivers us a lovely day.