Craft and cake

It's become incredibly clear to me that I'm suffering from stress. We're in a traffic jam at the moment in Central London and it's literally making my heart pound. Unnatural levels of adrenaline are cursing through my body. Still, there are only four days now until the court case, and just two weeks until my operation. With any luck, at this stage, I'll become a relatively normal person again! I have to be careful what I write in this blog, however, because wide swathes of it are currently being used in an attempt to somehow prove what a nasty bloke I am. I guess it's nice to know someone's reading...


We've spent the afternoon in Catford at Julie and Sam's craft and cake party. It happens once a month. A group of friends gather together to knit and sew and crochet whilst putting the world to rights. I was banned from the first five meetings after making rather disparaging remarks about the concept of craft. In my defence, I was never rude about cake! Anyway, I slipped in through the back door last month by framing pictures, and only a few eyebrows were raised today when I simply sat on a hammock gluing photos into an album, so I reckon I've been forgiven. Frankly, if I'm allowed another crack at winding wool on the special machine that was set up in the dining room, I'll be a happy man. It's one of the most therapeutic things I've ever done. Hypnotised by spinning wool!

Readers will be thrilled to know that Nathan has now finished the crocheting stage of his 1970s doily. I can't wait to show you all the photographs...

350 years ago, Pepys made his first visit to the victualling office in Smithfields. He went with Colonel Robert Slingsby and his mate, Major Waters, who we're told was deaf. I hope he was a good lip-reader, cus I'm pretty sure sign language hadn't been invented by then. (Cue hundreds of messages from people to tell me that it had!) The group then went to Woolwich and Deptford by water to do some Navy business, and on their way back were overtaken by the King, who'd been looking at his brand new yacht. They were also troubled by a massive downpour, "one of the greatest showers of rain that I ever saw" in fact! Not much fun, I guess, being in a boat on a river during one of the biggest downpours ever recorded. I remember almost sinking in a punt in Cambridge...