'Russian women.' Whenever I hear those two words, so full of intent and betrayal and James Bond intrigue, my heart stops. Oh, and when a grey-haired old married bastard suggests he may have told a friend that he feared he contracted a sexually transmitted disease during one of his dangerous, ego-boosting liaisons, I literally self-combust with rage and brim with solidarity for the long-suffering woman he betrayed. Because I have been exactly where Melinda Gates is (once with a husband, then with a boyfriend). And it isn't pretty. Bill Gates – yes, him, the man who always wears a cosy sweater and markets himself as one of the good guys, saving the poor from malaria and much else – has finally been compelled to spill all the beans about his numerous affairs. It came during lengthy testimony on June 10 to the House Oversight and Reform committee as part of an investigation into the late convicted financier and accused [expletive] trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

According to a transcript released Tuesday, the former world's richest man denied any sexual misconduct, lamented his links to Epstein and revealed the names of the two Russian women he said he slept with: Mila Antonova, a bridge player, and Karima Nigmatulina, a nuclear physicist (yeah, babe, you sure know how to blow up a marriage). Both women, you would think, had the brains to avoid him like the plague.

The reason I am so tender about any mention of Russians is that my last boyfriend, who said he loved me, wanted us to move in together, had been married to a Russian and was having an affair with a much younger Eastern European woman with a difficult name. Gates, 70, said Epstein somehow became aware of his affairs and may have been 'considering blackmailing' him over them. Gates informed the committee that when he told Melinda, his wife of 27 years, mother of their three children, about the Russians in 2013 it was 'very distressing to her' but they didn't talk about getting divorced.

I expect, like my husband, he had sobbed, 'Baby I love you so much!' and she had felt sorry for him and followed him to his yoga class (okay, the second was just me). Bill and Melinda finally did split in 2021 and it's not difficult for me to see why. Now, for the first-time, Gates has publicly admitted a third affair with a Dr Alice Jacobs Nesselrodt, a medical entrepreneur. And in a bizarre comment to the committee, Gates said he still thought that Antonova, who was 30 years his junior (oh my God he is so predictable, so ordinary, so sad!

He was 53, she was in her twenties), was a 'serious bridge player.' First, do not, whatever you do, praise one of the women you had illicit [intercourse] with (who, given his fame, I suspect, knew he was married; I don't care if you wear a white coat, you might as well turn up in Victoria's Secret given your morals, Madam!) My husband, when finally admitting one of many affairs immediately stuck up for his latest harlot, saying, 'She works for a not-for-profit! She signs her emails peace + love!'

There was also some lovely, wholesome talk (how dare he wear a sweater) of a suspected sexually transmitted disease: the Microsoft founder added that it was 'possible' he had told a mutual friend of his and Epstein's that he feared he may have caught an STD from one of the encounters. Literally, the sordid revelations make me want to throw up. After having [intercourse] with my boyfriend, who swore he was single and had not had [intercourse] for nine months, I was hospitalized with an infection so bad it had to be lanced without general anesthetic.

I wish I could have sat his bony bottom in front of an Oversight and Reform committee to be grilled, embarrassed, humiliated and unmasked, as Gates has been, despite the sweater, as yet another untrustworthy, amoral, sleazy, desperate old man who only manages to pull women with false promises. A cheating man not only denigrates himself: he makes - as Emma Thompson put it so eloquently in Love, Actually - our lives foolish. I am sure Melinda Gates, aside from counting her money (I got nothing!

Not even a fizzy water from my cheating men!), has been comparing herself with the Russians, with the medical entrepreneur, whatever in God's name that is, and not finding herself wanting, far from it. No doubt she is incredulous: you cheated on me for that! I birthed our children and you threw me over for that! I bet she will have picked apart their dress sense (the bridge player wears an Alice band, of all hideous accessories), lack of make-up (never trust a woman who doesn't wear make-up; they will turn out to be arrogant) and wondered what on Earth was the attraction?

Also, why was he hanging out with men (notably Epstein and the former Prince Andrew) who were clearly beneath him? When the whole world was at his varicose-veined feet! Gates is yet one more man who thinks money buys him class, who thinks philanthropy gilds him with goodness. You have shown your true colours, Bill Baby. I never did get on with PCs and Windows, what a load of clunky rubbish. I'm so happy I've always been an Apple gal.

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