A Hallowe’en party, and I was standing by the doorway to the living room when a woman I didn’t know approached me. She was a bumblebee. “How are you?” she asked.

“Doing well! How about you?”

“No,” she corrected, “you’re supposed to say, Miserable, darling, as usual. Perfectly wretched.”

“Oh?”

“Well, aren’t you Cruella de Vil?”

“Yep!” That was in fact my costume.

“I mean, with your furs and hair and everything, you really went all out! You look great, by the way.”

“Thank you!”

“So, let’s try again. How are you?”

“Um,” I said, trying to remember the line. “Miserable, darling. Perfectly wretched.”

She shook her head. “Oh, but you’ve also got to do the voice.”

“Um, sorry, I’m not a very good actor,” I admitted. I added a nervous laugh. “I just like dressing up. I can’t do voices.”

“Miserable dahling as usual, perfectly wretched,” she delivered in a rapid transatlantic patter, vowels theatrically drawn out, prancing about the living room, weaving amongst the revellers.

“Uh,” I stammered, resplendent in my furs. “Sorry, I can’t do accents. Or motions. I, uh, know I’m breaking character. Horribly. That’s just me.”

“How are you?”

We passed ten seconds in excruciating silence.

“Miserable dahling as usual, perfectly wretched,” I said.

She chuckled. “That’s good enough for now. Come, let’s get snacks.”