ONE of the older boys went to meet a girl in town recently.

He came home after being dumped by said girl with dog muck all over his shoes.

He wasn’t bothered in the slightest, although to me it seemed like one of the worst ever dates, comparable with the time his mum and I both got our cars stuck in the Co-op car park in Richmond, soon after we first met.

The boys are quite sensitive about me discussing their journeys to manhood in the paper so if you see them, best not to mention anything your read.

When they protest, I tell them it’s my job and their embarrassment pays for the high-speed internet and purchase of sugary breakfast cereals.

They soon pipe down.

Just as vocal was a mum-offour who collared me at a christening in Coverdale at the weekend.

She was cross about the new restrictions for parents who take their kids out of school during term-time.

I’ve done several minutes of research and discovered that from next month, headteachers will only be able to allow parents to take their children out of school during term for exceptional circumstance.

These include weddings and funerals – but not cheaper holidays.

The fines for unathorised absence will go from £50 to £60. That seems almost worth it if you’re saving £500 for a week in Spain outside the school holidays, but it’s apparently £60 per child and per parent, so it could cost the couple with four kids £480.

It remains to be seen whether headteachers will dob parents in or whether children will come down with a mysterious type of flu which lasts exactly a week.

After the christening, we had a night away in South Shields. I would definitely recommend it. The beach is excellent and there’s a fun park where you can shoot lasers at strangers and family members in a dark room.

We stayed at a hotel nearby which had one of those spinny machines on the corridor for cleaning your shoes.

“I should have bought my dog mess trainers,” the boy suggested.

I think he was being deadpan rather than dead stupid.