I WAS having a shave in the bathroom when I saw something in the mirror I didn't like.

At the end of my nose was a large angry red thing. A spot, a pimple, a zit. Call it what you like, it was definitely there.

"Help!" I shrieked downstairs to my wife.

She came hurtling upstairs, barged into the bathroom, tripped and fell full length on the floor.

"Must you?" she said, picking herself up and rubbing her sore elbows.

"Must I what?" I asked, puzzled.

"Must you shave in the bathroom?"

"But that's where men shave," I replied.

"Yes," she said through gritted teeth. "But your shaver's electric and I've just gone flying over the extension lead. Anyway, what did you scream me for?"

"Just cast your eyes on this!" I demanded, horrified. "Look what's growing from the end of my nose."

My wife shoved her face into my face. "You mean those little ginger hairs sprouting from your nostrils?"

"Funny you should say that," I said. "But ginger hair runs in the family - on my mother's side."

My wife's jaw dropped. "Your mother had a hairy side? What sort of people are you?"

"I think we're rather drifting away from the main issue here," I said. "I'm talking about my spot, pimple or zit."

"Hmm," my wife said. "Yes, I must admit it does make you look acutely foolish."

"Thanks a lot," I grumbled. "You know how to make a man feel good."

"A man, yes," my wife agreed enigmatically. "Anyway, why don't you nip to the chemist's for some soothing balm or unguent."

So I went to the chemist's. "Can you help me and my face?" I asked the assistant.

"Sorry, luv, I'm on pile ointments and cough mixtures," she said. "Tracy!" she called out across the shop. "Can you serve this bloke with the zit."

I fled the chemist's in embarrassment and weaved through crowds of shoppers, making sure I covered my nose as I whizzed past children and any adults of a nervous disposition.

"Can I see the doctor?" I asked the receptionist at the medical centre. "I don't have an appointment."

"Hmm," said the receptionist. "I don't think you need an appointment. That nose of yours looks really angry."

"The rest of me isn't feeling too placid, either," I said.

The doctor sighed when I walked in and did something he always does when I visit him - he reached for his manual of strange diseases.

"Zit down, er...I mean sit down, Mr Silver."

"It's about my nose, doc."

"I can see that," he said. "I could prescribe a course of antibiotics but I reckon it's just your germs that are holding you together. So I suggest you go home now - but please leave by the back door - and wash your face in warm water twice a day to open up the pores.

"I'm also going to prescribe you a special ointment. I suspect they don't manufacture it any more but, what the hell, it's the thought that counts."

So I went home, waited 20 minutes outside the bathroom while my wife fixed HER face with foundation, blusher and lipstick, then went in and splashed warm water over my nose.

"It opens the pores," I explained to my dog Brian who had followed me into the bathroom.

Brian glanced down at his feet. He looked puzzled.

"No, Brian," I said. "Pores. Not paws. Welcome to the human world of homonyms."

Brian shrugged and toddled off into the garden to pursue his latest hobby - digging up earthworms.

Three days later my spot, pimple or zit had disappeared.

"I feel like a new man," I observed cheerily over breakfast.

"So do I," my wife muttered under her breath.

"So what shall we do today?" I asked.

"You're not at work?" she asked, sounding almost disappointed.

"No, luv. It's Tuesday. I have every other Tuesday off. It's not the best day off in the week but..."

"Okay, okay," my wife snapped. "Just shut up, will you. You're beginning to get on my nerves."

There was a revival of Funny Face showing at my local multiplex but I decided to give it a miss in favour of another old film on at the studio next door.

It was a comedy about a young girl who lounges around in bed all day, talking in a funny voice and taking the mickey out of two clerics. I think the movie was called The Exorcist.

Anyway, I was really enjoying it until the girl's features started turning manky. It brought back memories of my zit.

"You're looking pensive," my wife said when I got home.

"Pensive? No, I was just thinking."

"About what?"

"About how to close my pores again. The doctor never explained."

My dog Brian resisted the temptation to look at his feet and went back outside to unearth more earthworms.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.