WHEN you're a dad, stains come with the territory. They're an occupational hazard.

You can always tell a new dad by the telltale throw-up stain on his shoulder. It is the stamp of fatherhood, the mark of a new man.

And the stains keep on coming as the years roll by, with food flung from high-chairs, paint splashed around, dirty shoe-marks from piggy backs, pens left on chairs, and life descending into general mayhem.

I only wish the woman at the dry cleaners would be a little more understanding. She is an Eva Braun-type figure, a skilled interrogator, who has turned going to the dry cleaners into a dreaded ordeal.

Whenever I go in with my suits, I'm questioned about my stains: "What's this?" she asks, pointing at the spot in question.

"Sorry, I'm not sure," I say, feeling a flush come over me.

"You must have a clue," she persists.

"It might by Ready Brek," I suggest, sheepishly.

She looks up at me through thin-rimmed glasses with that "How on earth did Ready Brek get on your lapel?" look she's perfected, then arches an eyebrow.

It reminds me of when I was little and, as a Catholic boy, I had to go to confession every week. How I hated going into that dark, musty closet, desperately trying to remember my latest sins: "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. This week I've told lies, took more than my fair share of chips at lunchtime, and momentarily wished that the headmaster would have a nasty accident."

The psychological scars are still there and the dry cleaners has become the new confessional: "Bless me, Eva, for I have stains. This week I have tomato ketchup, egg yolk, blue felt-tip, and a dollop of strawberry yoghurt."

I went in with a suit last week and I knew I was in for a particularly hard grilling: "What's this?" she asked, pointing to the blue line down the jacket sleeve.

"Biro," I replied, thinking it was obvious but not knowing how the hell it got there.

(Raised eyebrow.)

"And this?" she demanded, pointing to the white smear on my trousers.

"Toothpaste," I confessed.

I didn't wait for the eyebrow. With a small queue forming behind me, I found myself pouring my heart out.

"I've got four kids and it's bedlam in the mornings. My eight-year-old was rushing about, armed with his toothbrush. He's lethal with his toothbrush."

The eyebrow went up anyway. I waited to be given ten Hail Marys and an Our Father but she just tutted and turned away.

When I wore the suit for the first time since it had been dry-cleaned, I took it out of the cellophane and there was a note pinned to the inside of the jacket: "STAINS (UNREMOVABLE) WE'VE DONE OUR BEST."

Feeling admonished and ashamed, I put the suit on, somehow survived the morning chaos, and took Max to school.

Already exhausted, I sat on a bench in the playground and waited for the whistle.

"Excuse me, you're in our goal," said a little girl. "Will you be our goalie?"

Before I could reply, the all-girl game had kicked off, an attack came in, and a redhead with a powerful right foot whacked the ball into my groin.

To my dismay, it left a large, round mud stain on the front of my newly-cleaned trousers.

I immediately knew what was going to happen: I'd have to go back to the dry cleaners, lay my trousers on the counter, and Eva would point at my groin.

"What's this?" she'd ask.

"Mud."

"And how did that happen?"

"Well, I was playing football with the girls at school..."

THE THINGS THEY SAY

CYNTHIA Makepeace, from Butterknowle 50-plus Club, recalled the time Whisky, the pet Alsatian, had jumped up and scratched the table.

"Either that dog goes or I go," she seethed.

"You go, Mum, cos Whisky's my friend," said daughter Lynne, aged three.

TWINS - a boy and a girl - were in a tin bath in front of the fire in the old days.

The boy looked at the girl and said: "You haven't got one clagged on the side like me." (Also told at Butterknowle 50-plus Club).

I OWE you one, God." Our Max, eight, when Mum came home from the supermarket and announced that they'd sold out of broccoli.

THE THINGS THEY SAY

ABOUT THEIR DADS

"My father enforced discipline with a capital D. I used to call him the dictator. We had many arguments and there were times when I wouldn't talk to him for months. But now I'm a father, I catch myself behaving just as he did and I can see how much I misunderstood him." - Boris Becker.

Published: 06/10/2005