Singular Bliss

Last night I enjoyed what I can only describe as one of those 'single moments'. Sitting on the sofa quite late at night, watching tele, zapping a bit, then seeing that BBC2 is doing a 'catch up' evening of 'Heroes'. It's already 10.30pm and there are six episodes but you think, hey, what the hell, I'll catch up.

And I did. All six episodes except that I'd seen the last two so went to bed around 2am in the middle of the last one.

There are all sorts of pros and cons to being in a relationship, but the most glaring con in my opinion is that there is always someone else around, and they have expectations of you.

Say, for example, on Saturday nights you usually go to bed after a certain show. If you wanted to watch all six episodes of 'Heroes' you'd have to think about it, worry whether the other person would throw a strop because he was wanting nooky or go to bed without being disturbed in the middle of the night, and you'd have to explain, reason, justify.

You couldn't just sit there and do it. Sometimes you don't want to explain, reason, justify, negotiate; you just want to 'do'. But the other person expects you to behave in a certain way, because you usually do, and when you feel like doing something else, you are in fact setting up a chain reaction of spoiling things. Spoiling their expectations of you and thus their cosy rapport with you, and spoiling the thing you want to do because there is no particular reason for doing it other than just because you want to then and there, but having to think about it ruins the pleasure.

So my enjoyment of those episodes was all the sweeter because I was free to watch or not watch or stop watching half-way through. Singular bliss!