When Gordon Meadow's life falls apart, it does so with remarkable suddenness. A glass of wine overturned at a dinner party leads to a quick screw with his hostess which leads to...calamity. Gordon, pushing forty, with a dead end job as a teacher, is the sort of man who knows a little about quite a number of thing but not so much about anything in particular. He doesn't really know about women, but all of a sudden they have become a problem, in particular his wife Miranda and his former lover Sandy. Gordon's reaction is to bolt, leaving behind him a chaos that is only resolved when his daughter Penny - the only one who loves him for himself, unreservedly - takes matters into her own hands.