Downing tools

I had to stay up until an ungodly hour last night so that I could collect Nathan from the 24-hour Tesco on the North Circular Road. He was being dropped off after a singing gig by a lady in a very posh-looking convertible mini. It was at least 2am and I’d gone beyond tired and come out the other end. When we finally got home, it took me forever to get off to sleep. I lay in bed thinking about the countless emails I needed to send...


I’ve just returned from a meeting in Ladbrook Grove where I discussed various exciting-sounding projects with the wonderful Glynis Murray. Her company, Tomboy Films, has a wonderful atmosphere, and they make extraordinary films. They feel like a little family. Everyone sits down around the boardroom table and eats a communal lunch. Today's was macaroni cheese and an assortment of very tasty salads and cheeses.

As usual, it took me hours to get there. There were problems on that silly little pink line that goes from Liverpool Street to Hammersmith, which is painfully slow at the best of times, but today it excelled itself. Add to this the illogical LU decision to entirely remove the Northern Line from the rest of the underground network at King’s Cross, and you've got a seriously long journey on your hands. Does anyone understand the logic of this new subterranean layout? I swear that once you’ve travelled up escalators, walked along several winding corridors and then returned to the bowels of the earth, you're back where you started.

Anyway, I've downed tools for the day and plan to do nothing but watch television for the rest of the day. I’ve worked too hard this week and my brain doesn’t seem to want to deal with anything more...

September 10th 1660 was in the middle of the fair season and Pepys, having missed Bartholomew Fair, called in on the one in Southwark. Unfortunately, he doesn’t give us any tantalising descriptions of what he saw there. We’ll have to wait until 1663 to hear about monkeys dancing on ropes and various deformed animals in cages.

Later in the day, he called in at the naval office and found Sir William Batten at dinner with some friends on a good “chine of beef”. Pepys was invited to join them and he ate heartily, confessing to having been extremely hungry. In the evening Pepys went drinking with old friends and went to bed having drunk too much!