The waiting game.

 There are many milestones in a new relationship: the first date, the first kiss, the first sleep over - and then there are the true turning points, the great compatibility litmus tests, such as the first fart.

While many people talk dreamily of those initial narcotic months of love, wishing they could go on forever, for others it is a time of gaseous discipline, an uneasy truce as we silence our inner guns of Navarone.

 Holding fire down below, though, is just one small component of the waiting game we all play in a new relationship. As we negotiate our ship through the shoals of early love, most of us are on our best behaviour: we're agreeable, laugh (or at least chuckle) at our opposite number's silliest jokes and don't belch or litter. However, once we've found safe harbour and drop anchor, our personal habits surface like toothless, scurvy-ridden convicts emerging from the darkness of a First Fleet prison transport...
 So while many emphasise the significance of the first trip away together or the first "I love you", I believe there are other slightly more, umm, domestic crossroads that are just as important.

First fart:

 As we all know, men fart a lot and most are encouraged from an early age to give free expression to this part of themselves by sitting on friend's heads, as well as lighting said gasses to produce the legendary "flaming blue angel". Farting for men is both a sign of contempt and solidarity, a way to show affection and to do battle and they can produce the goods 24 hours a day, particularly when camping or in cars.

 I tell you this to give context to the restraint required by a man to shut down this noxious circus, which could be likened to holding back the ocean with a broom. Ripping one off is thus a defining moment in any courtship and allows both parties to quickly gauge their "fart compatibility". If either cries, screams or gags, it might be time for a breath of fresh air.

First wee with the door open:

 To share this universal shame with another is a big deal for some. Thus, when a woman is happy to sit and chat during a tinkle, or a man is relaxed enough to aim and talk over his shoulder, you know a threshold of comfort has been reached.

First wee in the shower:

 Remember those early days when you did everything together? You'd jump in the shower kissing and, after the first few times under the jets, one of you would "test the waters", the other quickly smelling if you'd been drinking coffee or eating asparagus. This is the next stage of intimacy, which some people try to accelerate by peeing on the other's legs. At least it washes off.

First poo:

 I have a male friend who claims he's never done a number two at the home of a woman he's in a relationship with. Considering he's now in his early 40s, still single, and has dated consistently his entire adult life, his self-control gives new meaning to the phrase "intestinal stamina". " My friend may also be trying to avoid burdening his girlfriends with the grotesque realisation that confronted Gulliver's Travels author Jonathan Swift.

He wrote in one of his poems:

No wonder how I lost my wits;
Oh! Caelia, Caelia, Caelia shits!

First poo with the door open:

 I think even Sigmund Freud, when jabbering like a chimp on his favourite tonic of cocaine, would agree that sometimes you have to draw a line and this is one of them. A number two with the door open indicates a lot of things about a relationship - earthiness, comfort and tolerance.  It also says - the romance is dead.

 We may be kings and queens in our heads, but this is one throne no one else needs to see us sitting on.