Close but no cigar

Well, I can honestly say I didn't sleep a wink last night, at least not before 6am, which has to be a record. I sat, wide awake, watching episodes of Pointless on iPlayer and a Top of the Pops from 1978. I don't know what was going wrong. It was a muggy, still night and my mind was busy with silly thoughts. Most likely, however, it was the fault of the seagulls! They performed a minimalist symphony throughout the night, squawking, screaming, squeaking and whinnying the most bizarre rhythmic patterns which would occasionally, and purely by chance, sound curiously tonal. I lay there, mind completely alert, attempting to transcribe the rhythms. Periodically, I'd hear such a weird noise that I'd leap to my feet and look out the window, staring out onto a darkened Hove street. A cat stalking a rat would creep out from behind a parked car, but the rest of the town was almost certainly sleeping. 

Except the seagulls. It would appear that Seagulls don't sleep. They hop around on roof tops, fighting and chatting quite happily until dawn, at which point they seem to become particularly excited. Sometimes hundreds of them start calling at once; often their shrieks synchronise and then start to phase. Sometimes they sound like old women laughing. 

I took myself for beans on toast on the beach and watched a man using a long oar to punt himself across the deep turquoise waves on a surf board. It must be some new-fangled sport, because he certainly wasn't going to get an opportunity to surf on a sea that was smoother than a snooker board! 

Today was perhaps the hardest of all the days we've had in PK's attic studio. Maybe it was the heat or the absence of fresh air, maybe it was the lack of sleep, but on one occasion I started to feel incredibly light-headed. A few moments later PK said he'd started to hallucinate and it struck me that the pair of us had sat for so long in the dusty sunlight pouring through his attic window that we were both suffering from heat stroke. I still feel incredibly odd.

We're so nearly there now in terms of comping and tuning the two Pepys movements, but it's been such hard work, and just as we thought we'd reached the end, a whole set of computer glitches set us back a number of paces. It wouldn't have been possible to get any further without the pair of us going mad, so I've hopped on the first London train. My August hay fever seems to have kicked in, so my nose is running and I'm sneezing like a trouper! I'd love a cup of tea, but these trains don't have buffet trollies.

Nathan, Julie and Michelle have gone to see Abbie in an open air production of Midsummer Night's Dream. It's a terribly dull, over-performed play, but I sincerely wish I was there to support Abbie and share the experience. Michelle mentioned picnic blankets in a group email and I suddenly started to feel a little sad.

Samuel Beckett watches over us from a postcard on PK's wall. His wise eyes and impressively-wrinkled forehead tell me to keep swimming against the tide. Sassoon delivers a similar message in his diary, striving to better himself, longing to become an important poet, rather than someone who just enjoys writing. I think we can all sympathise with that.