Spent today away from the office at Queen's Tennis Club, mostly locked in a room with the Gnome working on TV script ideas for a pets charity. The idea was to inspire us with different surroundings and we had a large room to ourselves with a view of a roof. Lengthy briefing this morning, from several people and a dog. When not taking up his stance at the head of the table, the dog lurked near the Danish pastries or, nastily, between my feet. At the end of the day they all reconvened (sans dog) and we had to present our ideas to a roomful of people. The Gnome and me managed to come out of it okay.

In the evening several of us took our client Julie out for a meal which was fun. Julie is the best of clients, excellent brain and a really decent person. Turns out she studied Philosophy like me.

However I was very disturbed, as I was about to fork into a fishcake, to get a call from one of my oldest friends Carl, who said he'd had a minor heart attack a week and a half ago. He is okay now, and taking tablets, but was feeling somewhat depressed. Felt very sorry for him, and somewhat shocked. He said he was definitely giving up cigarettes now, which is good. Took the wind out of my sails somewhat for the rest of my evening.

Below chairdog.