We are crossing the Scottish border when the heavens open. It's like a bad comedy punch line. "Welcome home," J's mum says from the back seat.
To make matters worse, Craig Charles is playing Summertime on Radio 2 as the rain begins to bounce off the road. The windscreen wipers go slicker-slacker double speed as we slalom down the A168 towards Jedburgh. Our holiday is drifting – damply – into the past tense.
For the last few days we've been wandering around Northumberland, visiting Lindisfarne and Alnwick [1], meeting up with old friends in Newcastle [2], and even popping into the Metro Centre just for old times' sake. J and I haven't been there since the Britpop era. [3] We don't recognise it at all.
These choices meet with differing levels of approval from Daughters Number One and Two. All, though, are better than our first day when we take them to see Hadrian's Wall.
"You live near the Antonine Wall. You'll have completed the set," I tell them in an attempt to get them to buy into the trip. Any emotional currency remains firmly in their pockets however. "It's up a hill and the hill is covered in sheep poo," Daughter Number One said as we approach Housteads. She doesn't linger when we get there. And she doesn't even get out of the car when we stop off at Vindolanda.
But then we've had holidays where she never got out of the car on any day so actually this year is an improvement. Even so, any hint of a castle or anything vaguely historical is met with a contemptuous dismissal. She doesn't even come with us when we go to Lindisfarne.
The rain has just about passed by the time we arrive in Jedburgh. We stop for a coffee in a lovely cafe-cum-book shop facing the abbey. And we do the inevitable holiday debrief.
"What was your favourite bit?" I ask. The shops, they say. Eating ice cream, they say. None of the places we took them to especially. "Not even one?" I ask despairingly.
Hurrah, there is. Daughter Number Two starts talking about our trip to Bowes Museum down in North Yorkshire. "I really liked the Yes Saint Lawrence exhibition".
"Yes Saint Lawrence? Oh, you mean Yves Saint Laurent."
"Is that how you pronounce it?"
"Well," I say, "he was French." I try to think of something to compare it to. "You pronounce it like you'd pronounce Ralph Lauren
"But he was American," Daughter Number Two says. She knows her fashion designers.
"Yes. But it's fashion. It's complicated. Shall we have a look around Jedburgh?" I say, trying to change the subject.
"I just want to go home," Daughter Number One announces. We shuffle back to the car.
I guess that means the holiday's over.
[1] In Barter Books I saw a copy of the first Blue Peter annual I owned. I didn't give in and buy it, though. It's about the only thing I didn't.
[2] Hi Gill and Tony.
[3] Back when we lived in Durham and didn't have kids. I wasn't thinking 'those were the days'. You can't prove I was.
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