Dear father Simon and the collective,

My confession takes me back to the time when I was married. My husband and I had our ups and downs, as a lot of couples do, but this doesn’t excuse what I did. However his mother-in-law and I only had downs, as she thought no one was good enough for her little boy, which is why I was number two of his now three wives.

She informed me when I married him that her son only ate the best brands and more importantly only drank the best coffee. Except his (or her) taste in so-called ‘best coffee’ was, frankly, vile. Well after some time trying to drink this muck I could not longer drink the brand he liked (it was the one with the dubious hand action, if you remember the adverts) so I bought a different coffee and swapped jars for seven years. He never noticed but this was not the only challenge to his taste buds…

We were going through a little rough patch, and after ignoring my feelings for a week or so on this certain occasion, I decided I’d show him how I felt rather than tell him, and make him a special meat pie. His mother had already informed me it was one of his favourites, and I followed her instructions to the letter…well, almost.

Iff I went to get the ingredients I needed to make the pie I had in mind. The finished product was a gorgeous large pie, and I’d even taken the time to decorate the pastry. Well teatime came and I served him a slice of pie with veg and potatoes, all beautifully presented on the plate. He tucked in, only stopping to ask why was I not eating? I said I’d had a large lunch and may eat a little later, so he completed his meal. A couple of hours later it was time for him to go off to do night shift. I was in the bath so he called through, he was "going to take the rest of the pie to work for him and lads at work", as it was best I had ever made. I had no time to object as he was off out the door pretty sharpish.

So off my pie went and next morning an empty plate returned. He said again how nice it was and all the lads at work had agreed. He packed himself off to bed leaving me feeling a bit guilty. I went into the kitchen and emptied the contents of the kitchen bin into the outside bin so he couldn’t see what was in there, which included a couple of large tins of very cheap dog food, a couple of spoonfuls of cat food, and a small sprinkling of bird seed, which happened to be the meat in the said pie that he and his work colleagues had devoured the night before. I must say at this point father Simon and listeners, DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME!

A couple of weeks passed and my hubbie suggested "why don’t we have meat pie like the one you made the other week, that was great and I’m sure lads will help me finish it off again." I talked my way out of making such a pie and suggested one of his other favourites .I never made pie again and luckily, at least with hindsight, a few months later we spilt.

I beg your forgiveness father Simon for the deceit on switching the coffee, but I do not want forgiveness for feeding him the pie! However I do ask for forgivingness for the poor unsuspecting work colleagues who had to endure the special pie and forgiveness to the dog food company for the misuse of their product.

I hope you can see it in your hearts to forgive me.

Diane.