Puzzles solved

'Mum, come quick! My wee smells,' the desperate shout came from Jake, the nine-year-old.

Ginny rushed to his aid. Then another shout from the upstairs loo. 'Mine does too.' It was Ben, the 11-year-old.

'Mine's alright,' said Nick, the 14-year-old. Boys pee in packs in this house.

'Clive, come here,' Ginny shrieked. Clive rushed into the already crowded downstairs loo.

'What's going on?'

'The boys stink.'

'Thanks Mum.'

Clive wrinkled his nose. 'That's asparagus.'

'What?'

'We had asparagus for tea didn't we? Asparagus makes your wee smell. It's a well known fact.'

'It doesn't make my wee smell,' said Ginny.

'It doesn't make everyone's wee smell. It's like being able to roll your tongue, you can either do it or you can't - it's in your genes.' And with that Clive returned to perusing the horse racing form.

Nick immediately logged onto the internet and typed asparagus and urine into Google. 'Wow that's really interesting,' he exclaimed. 'Did you know: the body converts a substance in asparagus into a metabolite called methyl mercaptan, or methanethiol, which is a sulphur-containing derivative of the amino-acid methionine.'

'What does that mean?' asked Jake.

'It means your wee smells,' said Ben helpfully.

'There's more,' Nick continued. 'Did you know that some people make smelly urine after eating three or four spears of asparagus while others can eat a whole pound of the stuff and not make any smell. And about 40% of the population have the genes that make smelly urine from asparagus . . .' he scrolled down the page.

'And,' he continued. 'The ability to smell asparagus-tainted urine is also inherited. And, it says here, don't panic because it's not harmful. And asparagus is highly nutritious and the richest known source of folic acid known.

'Well there you are! More asparagus anyone?'

As Nick was reading aloud Ginny had gone very quiet. She was thinking.

'Ben, when you said Arrow's wee smelt the other day did it smell like your wee just now?'

Ben wrinkled up his nose, pressed his forefinger to his lips and answered: 'Yes. I think so.'

'Clive, has Arrow been in the vegetable garden?'

It was Clive's turn to look thoughtful. Various scenarios were playing out in his mind. Including the one where Ginny hits the roof because Clive was meant to have fenced off the vegetable patch but didn't quite have enough chicken wire to go all the way around so he skimped and left quite a decent hole at the back, just out of sight, by the ivy.

'Errrr,' you could tell he was weighing up whether it was worth lying. 'I don't know, has he?' he ventured pathetically.

Ginny was on the warpath now. She stormed out to the garden and patrolled the fenced off veggie patch.

'Clive! What's the point of this?' She'd found the botched fence. 'No wonder my asparagus hasn't put in an appearance this year, that b****y puppy has been eating it before it's even got through. You were supposed to fence this off . . . . '

At this point the boys and I stopped listening. Ben and Jake turned the telly on for The Simpsons. Nick went up to his room to practice bar chords on his guitar. I curled up in my basket hoping they'd all ignore the fact that I'd been gorging myself for several days on choice asparagus tips. From the garden the faint hum of argument rose and fell. At least the mysteries of my smelly wee and Ginny's disappearing asparagus have been solved. And Ginny has one less thing to worry about. With all that asparagus I won't be suffering from vitamin or mineral deficiencies.