Autocue village

We left Brother Edward's rather late last night and because I had a crumblingly early start, I didn't really get that much sleep. 

I'm currently at the BBC, sitting in autocue village in a ten minute oasis of tranquility before the mayhem kicks in and we record Matt's show. 

I rather like the calm you always get before the storm of a well-organised recording. Everyone goes on a break at the same time, and silence descends. I even have the time to write this blog whilst pulling pieces of roquette out of my sandwich. Roquette, in my opinion, is the scourge of all vegetarian cuisine. No veggie dish seems complete these days without a mountain of the stuff obliterating all the nice flavours with its bitter after taste. 

Today's rehearsal went well, although it was utterly exhausting towards the end; a combination of my being knackered and Matt making a lot of last minute changes to the script. The last hour turned out to be one of the biggest adrenaline rushes I've ever had. I was making notes with my left hand and spooling through the script with my right, whilst operating a talk back system with my chin! The moment there was a pause in the script, I was double checking things I'd been forced to type at freakish speeds seconds before. I deserve every minute of this break! It's a shame I couldn't find anything more interesting to eat than this blessed tasteless, soggy BBC canteen sandwich. I did want soup, but it was carrot and coriander flavoured, and smelt, like coriander always does, of baby sick, soap and phlegm. 

350 years ago, Pepys was a very busy man. He was invited to a dinner, and turned up to find no one there who he recognised, so went home in a bit of a strop, feeling horribly hungry

He went to a pub with Sir William Penn after a walk in the freezing air at Moorfields, and ate a plate of cheese and bread, before calling in on the other Sir William, who was absent, but his daughter fed him the spoils of last night's dinner, which were apparently fabulous!