A day of two halves By the time I had sent off my biography to Island Ink this morning I was busily detesting everything I've ever written and viewed life as a heap of rotting beans. When the storm outside abated I went for a walk in the rainy Laines and bought, in a slightly self-flagellating way, excellent books by Mario Petrucci and Mimi Khalvati, poets I knew well who have gone on to become quietly famous. Things started to cheer up moments later when I randomly bumped into Cathy and we went for a coffee and fairly wide-ranging discussions about life and portfolio careers. I went for a cobweb-blasting walk by the sea. I loved being on the wind-lashed pier. The fairground rides were all closed, and I stood by the merry-go-round, which creaked and shifted in the wind. My clothes were flapping, the wind roaring in my ears, closed shutters rattled, and the sea seethed below the boards. Quite suddenly all my petty concerns were blown off like a clump of sea spume, and I felt myself ...