And rattling on the roof

It's been an incredibly tough day. I've basically spent the last fourteen hours formatting music for Beyond The Fence. Nathan has been making structural changes. I've no idea if his instincts are good ones. All I know is that we don't really have the time to do them and I must have let my guard down or something because I've been on a remarkably short fuse all day. There's no room left in my head to deal with this project. It's literally stolen everything from me.

I went out for a drive at about 10pm and took myself off to Gateway Services for a cup of tea. I was a little surprised when the man in Starbucks actually boiled a kettle! I'm not sure what was wrong with his hot water machine, but he didn't seem to think it odd at all that it took five minutes to make me a tea. Imagine trying to do that in the rush hour! He stood over the kettle impatiently waiting for it to boil. I might as well have been in my own kitchen.

The service station was absolutely empty. As it got closer to midnight, it became like a graveyard. I worked for two hours listening (when not plugged into headphones) to the rain tapping on the roof and the sound of a faulty electric light buzzing and zipping it's random rhythms. I think there was some music coming out of a distant speaker. I'd occasionally zone into a tune I recognised. I barely recognise any pop music these days. I never thought that would happen to me...

As I drove home, the heavens well and truly opened. The roads took on the quality of black glass and every street lamp and car light was reflected brilliantly. The road was glaringly red, then white, then orange and then blue for a fleeting moment of ecstasy as an ambulance sped its way northwards. It was mesmeric. Great lakes started forming on the Tarmac. The car in front of me, with its little Christian fish symbol on the rear bonnet, decided to drive through every puddle. Great waves of water would fly up on both sides. Maybe the car's owner was imagining how it felt to be Moses parting the Dead Sea!

I parked up outside our house and sat in the car for a moment, dreading the idea of leaving the car and getting soaking wet, and thinking about life and the universe whilst remembering the time Tammy, Hannah and I, as sixth formers, slept the night in our conservatory. We slept in a line. It must have been Hallowe'en because we'd carved out some pumpkins and went to bed with them protecting us like faithful dogs. I vividly remember the sound of rain on the roof: that feeling of being wonderfully warm, all wrapped up in a duvet, whilst nature ran riot outside.

My mind then placed the Abba song The Day Before You Came on a loop, allowing it to infiltrate every corridor of my brain, obliterating any other thought I had: "And turning out the light, I must have yawned and cuddled up for yet another night. And rattling on the roof I must have heard the sound of rain, the day before you came."

Mood: definitely wistful!