Rain on my parade…..

I’m toying with putting the boiler on. My feet are freezing even though I am wearing little white knitted sippers. My fingers are frozen, I refuse to resort to mittens and my nose has a cold tip like Jackson used to have.
I’ve eaten two bowls of salad, done my emails, eaten half a tub of blueberry yogurt – the soya kind surprisingly good – sorted out my twitter – made myself a green drink to get the acid out of my body, and talked to Hollywood, Uckfield, Monmouthshire and Hackney.
I have to finish reading Mr. Frisby’s book for tomorrow and then set about sleeping.

The flat is light and airy even though the rain is teeming down. The lodger has gone away for two weeks which means I can be as naked as I like for as long as I like, although in weather like this disrobing is a complete no-no.
At 5.15 this morning I heard a skid outside the bedroom window. Sure enough a motor cyclist had come off his bike. A white van man ran to his rescue but I could see the poor biker was in real pain. Makes me uncomfortable when bikes are involved given that Jim’s dad bought it on a Triumph and the old git has a machine of his own.
I toyed with getting up and doing something sensible like writing or going to a Bikram Yoga class in Balham. 6.30 start, sweaty and healthy, in the event I went back to a funny kind of sleep.
I am having to deal with my blood sugar. I have put it off long enough and my lovely acupuncturist finally pushed me into pulling my head out of the sand pit.
So now I take blood samples, put droplets on a strip of card which I shove into a little machine which reads my glucose level.
Last night my blood sugar was good. This morning it was dreadful, this afternoon a little better. I have been shamed into taking my body seriously again.
I walked into Victoria, left too late to do the whole St. James’ Park thing, grabbed a tube to Green Park and another to Leicester Square and then walked into China Town.
I pulled up my collar like Humphry Bogart and braved the squalls. Into my favourite Chinese supermarket where they sell everything from pork trotters to little white bulls, sorry bowls.
I bought a bottle of aloe vera juice and a bag of chinese pears. Juicy white apples really. I have a bit of a routine when I get into the studio. I place my pear on the desk, STOP IT, go and get three large paper towels from the machine, sneak out my serrated knife from the canteen and cut the pear into slithers. The juice is delicious and it takes just the same amount of time to eat as it does to sort out my emails.
Bradders, my editor, and I decide on the stories, she sets about gathering in the guests whilst I write my ‘talk-ups’, the bits you hear at the top of the hour.
We started today with Home Schooling. Fascinating why some people choose to teach their off-spring at home. If you go to Caitlin Moran’s article in ‘The Times’ you’ll understand why it’s a seductive way to bring interesting people into the world.
Then we did cleavages and old wrinkly skin. I say if you’ve got it flaunt it as long as you can deal with the eyebrows to heaven stuff.
I solemnly talked to Marco Pierre White about Keith Floyd, and dedicated the last hour to Patrick Swayze.
We chatted about break dancing as a sport and Bikram Yoga as a sport and discussed popping, breaking, crumping and other manic versions of the rumba.
And then the very delightful, gorgeously friendly, fabulously articulate, ridiculously charming, wonderfully talented JOHN BARROMAN came into the studio to talk about Le Cage Au Howsyourpapa. Lots of people called to talk to him I just sat on his knee for a photo and held onto his biceps. Well it was an afternoon of extreme activities.
I left really quickly BOUGHT an Evening Standard, I hate those free papers, changed at Green park and ran out of Victoria to get the 170. I cursed under my breath as hoards of people with wheely cases got in the way of me and my chariot. In the end I decided, since the rain was filling my trainers to grab a taxi.
The lashing water and my heavy breathing made the windows steam up, I opened it just enough to let the air in, when we arrived back at the flat the inside of the door was soaking wet.
‘It’ll dry.’ said the cabbie flatly.
Took off my clothes in the hall, dragged on my pyjama trousers and a thick cardigan, made a salad, did my emails and, well you know the rest.
I’m off now to finish KISSES ON A POSTCARD, drink my horrible green drink and stop worrying about my health. You know what its like, the rain, autumn, the nights drawing in, another summer gone, figuring that I only have about 20 Septembers left, the on-set of old age, should it be earth or fire, what kind of music shall I have at the funeral, who shall I invite, what happens if my friends cant make it, will I ever be as successful as Holly Willoughby, poor girl she sounds like a fart in the bath, which isn’t a bad idea actually – a bath that is.