Brainwashing CD on the train. Work considerably better than yesterday, despite the simultaneous pitches. Late lunch, sloped off to Chiswick where Nicki cut my hair in the time honoured fashion. But as she held up the mirror to the back of my head I again noticed the Area Of Concern.

Spoke to MJ as I wended my way back to the office. Afternoon doing a certain amount this and that, which it included a chat about a Christmas version of my hospital ad. Thunderstorm over the office with pelting hailstones, and I watched a seagull high up being battered earthwards by the ice.

Working late again tonight. Ended up having a quick drink in the bar before commencing the long slog home. Reading more popular poems on the train... Always loved the beginning to Ode to the West Wind from Shelley, which is suitably autumnal:

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odors plain and hill:

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh, hear!