under another sun

A poor night's sleep, worrying about the house sale. Got up at four and wrote a letter to the letting agents for an hour before returning to bed to lie awake. Up early and slipping on the desk manacles, slogged for many hours on blood clots to meet my deadline. Lorraine working at home today, which is always soothing. She and Betty slipped off to the florists around the corner to discuss nosegays at one point. Blood clots done, sent a stiff letter to the letting agents after showing it to Lorraine, then off to the gym, which allowed me to shed some of my growliness. The business of using the gym as a way of regulating murderous impulses is a boon. Later I received a reply from the agents, who have offered to lower their fee for doing nothing, for which I suppose I must be grateful. Home to hear from Robin Houghton (a new poet friend I met at the poetry workshops) had seen my name on the back of the latest Frogmore Papers magazine. However my actual poem appears to have...

A tidy mind Decided at the last minute against a day of Buddhism with Sophie, and instead chose to get to grips with my home which had plummeted into a shambolic mess. Fortunately Sophie was fine about it, and we'll meet up in the next week or so. A lovely chat. Having known each other since we were 19 it really feels like we are brother and sister sometimes. She may be coming down to Brighton with the family again soon, which will be fun. So a day of laundry, washing up, washing kitchen and bathroom floors. And now I can almost walk properly again. To celebrate this excellent news, I went shopping: buying food and shirts, energy-efficient lightbulbs (following mass lightbulb suicide pact over the last few days) and special bathroom cleaning spray that kills mould, and a backup disk drive so that if my laptop is stolen again or blows up I haven't lost all my work. Stupidly I began shopping for this last thing without consulting Anton. What was I thinking? A quick chat with him ...

Pea soup and venison stew Fog update - according to the BA website it looks like my flight to Japan will be happening tomorrow. My flight is BA0005. I have reserved my window seat in advance and it has bags of legroom. For it is a fact that if I stare anxiously out of the window, wringing my hands and muttering prayers under my breath, this is the main contributor to the safety of all on board. Not that they thank you for it, especially the ones sitting next to you. I have Lord of the Rings on my iPod and loads of drugs so all should be well. Typically, this is the most protracted amount of fog I have ever experienced. Brings to mind London's old pea soupers in which it was impossible to see a pickpocket held in front of your face. Those were the early industrial days where smoking chimneys turned London's fog into a dense noxious smog. This inspired Monet in his painting of the Houses of Parliament, not to mention Jack the Ripper. Popped up the road to give young Klaudia and ...