New drinks all round

My eventful weekend as a makeshift barmaid learning the ropes

My cousin Jacqui runs a nice, comfortable, rather old-fashioned hotel in a location that looks like the backdrop to every edition of Countryfile.

It was in her husband's family for three generations, but he died suddenly five years ago. Since then, she's managed it pretty much single-handed, occasional help from her son and daughter.

'Why don't you come up for a long weekend?' she said a couple of weeks ago. 'It will be relaxing,' she said. 'We've got a swimming pool and a beauty spa. Go on, you know you want to, and I've not seen you for absolutely yonks.'

Jacqui is possibly the only person in the country who still uses the work 'yonks'. As we all know, this is short for 'donkey's years'. So why isn't it 'donks'?

On the weekend she suggested, Mr Dear was going off with his chums from the rugby club, eating too much and talking about their bad backs, dicky knees and heart medication. Good luck to them.

So, after consulting Jacqui, I asked my sister Deb. 'They've got a beauty spa, a pool and everything. And we've not seen Jacqui for yonks,' I said.

'Yonks?' said Deb. 'What's yonks?' Anyway, here we are in her lovely hotel. And, quite frankly, we're run off our nice, comfortable feet.