Sean must have a swimming hat or the teacher says he absolutely definitely won't be allowed into the pool. This at 5.45 p.m., the shops are shutting at six and the lesson is at 6.30. Ah, please! Anna has a hearing test and stoutly refuses to budge without her bunny. Her bottle can't be found either and she's bound to rise on that one soon. Robert sits Buddha-like in the middle of the mayhem, watching the madness with big blue eyes. The trouble will come later with this one, I feel. It's those eyes; they'll break hearts yet.

Then there's the inhaler question. Is Sean wheezy or just breathless from jumping up and down shouting about his hat? The medicine can leave him a bit, well, lively, and he's bad enough already. I consider sewing up the legholes on a pair of underpants to make a kind of makeshift swimming hat, but we haven't stooped that low yet! "I'll give you a note," I concede - the safety valve of the frazzled parent. Blame me, leave my offspring alone!

The hearing clinic is packed with toddlers-in-waiting. There's a palpable undercurrent here. All these children are more or less the same age, and it's not just hearing that's being tested here, it's parenting. Sing your Barney song, darling, clap hands and please, please don't let me down.

I don't think I've ever met a mother genuinely enthralled by another child the same age as her own - there's always an edge there.

Whatever about hearing, if aggression were being tested, Anna would be off the scale. "Give the car to Mammy," suggests the nurse. A blunt "NO!" The bricks meant for stacking are used as missiles and, eventually, all the accoutrements are scattered viciously.

When the ever-patient nurse tries shaking a rattle, it is swiped from her hand and Anna screams with what seems like a never-ending supply of oxygen. I am not a bad person - what have I done to deserve this? "Would she have 50 words?" asks the nurse. "Oh, definitely," is my speedy response.

I'd say she had a thousand if it sped my egress from this place of torture. Didn't someone once tell me that girls were more placid?

I drag her screaming from the clinic, trying to smile and nod at other mothers I know, as their smugness swells. Robert trots benignly behind me, smiling at a little blonde mini-babe.

Sean returns, and all is well in his world. The note was accepted, he got off with a caution and can he get diving goggles for next week? Then Anna bursts tornado-like into the kitchen, a look of sheer power on her face.

"I smacked Robert," she announces, with perfect diction. Fifty words? I don't know, but she'll be all right, that one.