MY wife and our only daughter have always been close – more like sisters really – and, now that Hannah’s living in London, they miss each other like mad.

The Northern Echo:

They talk on the phone whenever they can and send each other photos – especially pictures of food. If either of them are in a restaurant, or cooking something new, they feel compelled to send a picture of the dish in front of them. Strange, I know, but that’s the way they are.

Hannah’s a dancer these days and she’s on tour, performing at venues all over the country.

That means she’s often on a train which is passing through her home town of Darlington – and her mum can’t resist.

The train only stops at Darlington for a minute or so but my wife has to be there to have a quick chat, a hurried hug – and to pass on some food. She says the station staff are very accommodating in letting her through the barrier.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love my daughter dearly but I can’t always be at Darlington railway station when her train whizzes through.

I was up to my eyes at work last week, trying to keep on top of the world of news. It’s getting more and more hectic in these days of the internet and social media and, to make matters even more challenging than usual, the horoscope had been cut in half by some kind of computer glitch.

It never ceases to amaze me how upset people get when something goes wrong with the horoscope. It’s as if the stars have fallen out of the sky. The phones and emails go mad.

I even had one reader who wrote to say we really should have seen it coming.

My day had got steadily worse.

Stories were breaking all around me, my pen had leaked in my jacket pocket, and I was in trouble for being late for a meeting with the boss.

The final straw came when a reader called to demand an explanation about why on earth the Horace and Doris cartoon had been moved to a different page.

“What are you thinking of ?” he said, adding that his wife wasn’t at all happy either.

It was in the middle of this madness that I received a text from my wife, alerting me to the fact that our daughter was heading back to London from Dundee and her train would be passing through Darlington station in half an hour.

“I’m going up there to wave. Meet me there!” she texted. She’d already fleetingly delivered a large Bakewell Tart on the northerly journey a few days earlier, and she had an apricot frangipane ready for the trip home.

Regrettably, I had to text back to say I was a bit tied up, having arrived at the conclusion that dads must be busier than mums.

So if you happen to see a middleaged woman carrying a strawberry cheesecake or Black Forest gateau through Darlington station, and then running along the platform, trying to keep up with an express train while waving manically, you’ll know who it is.

THE THINGS THEY SAY

THANK you to the villagers of Neasham, near Darlington, for turning out to hear me speak at the Reading Rooms last week. And special thanks to Amanda Day for telling me about the time she was potty-training her son Thomas. Amanda was driving home with Thomas in the back seat and he shouted:

“I need a poopoo! I need a poo-poo!” Amanda told Thomas to hang on, explaining they were nearly home.

“But I need a poo-poo. I really, really do,” he insisted.

“Just pinch your cheeks for a few minutes,” said Amanda.

When she looked in the rearview mirror, she saw her little boy, gripping his face tightly and groaning: “It’s not working, Mummy.”

JOE Westcott, ten, of Middlesbrough, was asked by his dad what hurt the most after nine physically bruising encounters in the Catholic Voice Cup football tournament which saw his team knocked out in the semi-finals.

“My pride,” came the reply.