Harry Potter and the inevitable internet download

It's only Thursday and already there's a Harry Potter book torrent on the internet! Seeing as I'm entirely against spoilers where HP is concerned and am paying full whack for it at midnight on Friday, I'm not going to read it or even look at it, and therefore don't know if it's true. It's definitely illegal though, so don't look at it.

If you tell me who dies/lives/etc, I will hunt you down and kick you in the shins VERY VERY HARD. Although not as hard as the pious twat going on about JK Rowling's literary pretensions in the Guardian today.

Mercury

So, the shortlist for this year's Mercury Music Prize (sod off Nationwide, you don't roll of the tongue fast enough) consists of actually good bands and albums that deserve it. Be still my beating disappointment. Oh hang on, Basquiat Strings have been nominated whoever they are. I hope they have beards.

Bat for Lashes - Fur and Gold
Fionn Regan - The End of History
New Young Pony Club - Fantastic Playroom
Klaxons - Myths of the Near Future
The Young Knives - Voices of Animals and Men
Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
Maps - We Can Create
The View - Hats Off to the Buskers
Dizzee Rascal - Maths + English
Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
Jamie T - Panic Prevention
Basquiat Strings - Basquiat Strings with Seb Rochford

Bat For Lashes - My favourite album of last year and one of the best I've heard in my entire life. Weird enough to win, those Bjork/Kate Bush comparisons should come in well here.

Fionn Regan - Didn't hear it. Is it any good?

New Young Pony Club - Despite the fact Ice Cream's been bothering the radio since early last year, nobody seemed to notice until they suddenly started being picked up by the TopShop trash as something that might sound cool on the school bus. Not new rave, NYPC are fucking fantastic and straddle enough genres to be cutting edge without boring anybody.

Klaxons - Indie. Good indie mind, but nothing more. Haven't we had enough of indie yet?

The Young Knives - Such jollity and cheeriness in ones so be-spectacled. Graham Coxon has a lot to answer for.

Arctic Monkeys - See Fionn. Sounds exactly the same as the first one, surely.

Maps - No

The View - Christ no.

Dizzee Rascal - Had his awards allowance plus he's already changed the landscape once and it's someone else's turn.

Amy Winehouse - Much as I adore the Winehouse, Back To Black isn't actually great all the way through. If she had a less amazing voice, we'd all be a bit bored.

Jamie T - FUCK NO. He's from Wimbledon, and for some reason this annoys me more than that fucking Stella song.

Basquiat Strings - See Fionn. Sounds like it should be a lingerie ad.


I'm going to put money on Bat For Lashes, partly because I've been wittering on about the album and keep getting told to shut up for looking like a converted Christian, and partly because I think she has a Helen Mirren/Oscar chance of winning. IE: they don't let her win, they're entirely blind. Go Bat!

Lowri Turner - Mommy Dearest, the racist version

I was at Latitude all weekend and thus missed out on the pleasures of Holy Moly, which is getting less rubbish with every week.

In case you hadn't already had the pleasure of reading the cretinous ramblings of Aryan crone Lowri Turner in the Mail (obviously), here she is wailing about how difficult it is that the baby she's just had with her British-Indian husband looks nothing like her, the please read on.

(You might also like her searing piece on political issues entitled: "However much I love my gay friends, I don't want them running the country", published in last year's Western Mail)

The article is, at best, an attempt at honesty made with all the finesse of an elephant knitting a scarf. At worst, this is going to seriously fuck that poor kid up when she's older. What's even more horrible is that Turner announced the divorce from her husband only a week before and said she felt "Embarrassed, humiliated, hurt, angry, sad, guilty, confused." Eurgh - horrible thought shudder etc - was this article was a way of getting back at him? For fuck's sake woman, boil a rabbit.

Lowri on her third child:

"Into this positively Scandinavian next generation, I have now injected a tiny, dark-skinned, dark-haired girl. To say she stands out is an understatement."

"Don't get me wrong, I love her...But when I turn to the mirror in my bedroom to admire us together, I am shocked. She seems so alien. With her long, dark eyelashes and shiny, dark brown hair, she doesn't look anything like me. "

"No more Brady Bunch kids for me."

"My love may not be colour blind, but hers is, and that is truly humbling."

THE WOMAN IS UTTERLY INSANE.

I've got red hair, my mum is fair. I'm transparently white, she's got a permanent gardening tan. We look nothing like each other but share enough neuroses and vocal mannerisms to make it patently obvious that we're related. It's a child, not a bloody handbag.

Even the Daily Mail comments looked askance after the inevitable openers: "Searingly honest maybe, possibly commendably so. But in my opinion Lowri needs to 'get a grip', give herself a damn good talking to, pull herself together, get over herself etc and get on with the business of bringing up the three children she knowingly brought into this world, blonde, brown, black or whatever colour they may be."

Start placing bets on the date when baby Turner mum-divorces the hand-wringing idiot woman.

I read this and was furious. Then I read the comments at the bottom and laughed like a demented coffee maker. Bloody ridiculous idea: yes, English is an illogical and irrationally spelled language but when you've got the hang of it it's the most beautiful thing around. I love the way we have a "eau" which in no way follows the French. Or even itself. Or indeed any kind of rational thought pattern. I love the fact you can mix round all the letters in it and still read it. I just adore its words: vexed, coruscating, flim-flammery, favourite, amazing, blazing, lashes, enzymes, mitochondria. Luscious. Germany apparently tried to rejig their spelling a few years ago and ended up with excess f's. Bleurgh.

The greatest party invitation ever.

In raging fury and ffs-ness at the sheer inability of a functioning website to hire enough people to make it run, I've started up a new blog chronicling my attempts to give up smoking. Read it, let me know what you think. If you read this blog regularly you will be doubtless thrilled to know that I've already updated the other one with more fervour and dedication than I've ever bothered here. New skills.

http://nobodylikesaquitter.blogspot.com

Also, to anyone else wondering if I got paralysed/killed/bored on the Central line this morning, I was saved from taking my usual train by deciding to get up later and have a shower instead. Cleanliness is next to undeadliness.

So live music is slowly swilling down the plughole of closing venues and crap soundsystems (Spitz! Astoria! Glastonbury Pyramid Stage!). A while ago a petition was started up to express disapproval at "burdensome licensing regulations" that were inappropriate for live music and dance, and were not promoting these activities.

Well, ye-es, but then having your hearing buggered to death by cheap soundsystems turned up way past full isn't promoting them in a positive manner either. There should surely be some compromise between people wanting to have music at a volume that really shows it off to its best, and between pissing off the neighbours and people whose good will is relied on for live shows to exist in the first place. Although seriously: if Glastonbury could just make up their minds whether it was a crap soundsystem, an accidental blip by the sound desk or a request from the local council that resulted in The Killers's awful Sunday picnic sound, that'd be just dandy.

Here's the petition and the recent response from the Goverment.



2 July 2007

We received a petition asking:

"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to recognise that music and dance should not be restricted by burdensome licensing regulations."

Details of Petition:

"The recently introduced changes in licensing law have produced an environment where music and dance, activities which should be valued and promoted in a civilised society, are instead damaged by inappropriate regulation. We call on the Prime Minister to recognise this situation and take steps to correct it."


Read the Government's response

"Thank you for signing the epetition expressing concerns that the new licensing act is restricting music and dance.

"The Government recognises the vital role that live music and dance play in our national life and wants to see it expanded not reduced. So there is absolutely no intention of restricting performances through unnecessary licensing regulations. But it is also the case, of course, that some live performances can impact on the wider community, not least through noise, public safety or nuisance to local residents.

"So the aim of the Licensing Act was to streamline the system which had grown up over many years, reducing unnecessary burdens but giving local communities a greater say in the licensing decisions that affect them. The Act, for example, has removed the need to apply for several different permits to put on events and enabled more venues to put on performances.

"Overall the evidence so far does not suggest that the Licensing Act has had a negative impact on the amount of live music. Research for the Department for Culture, Music and Sport (new window) into the impact of the new rules on smaller venues found that twice as many found the licensing process easy as difficult. It also highlighted the fact that bureaucracy and expense were only rarely mentioned as reasons for not applying licences.

"But the Government does accept that some venues feel unnecessarily constrained by restrictive conditions. While those that have stopped hosting live music have generally been balanced by the emergence of new venues, we do recognise that the loss of an established venue can have an impact on individual musicians and music fans.

"It is in response to these concerns that DCMS has already set out areas where it thinks changes might be made to reduce further administrative burdens. The Government also set up the Live Music Forum in 2004 to monitor the impact of the Licensing Act and to recommend how government might better promote live performances. We expect to receive the Forum's findings and recommendations in the Summer and will look closely to see if action is needed."

'It is with great regret that we announce the closure of Fopp.

Our store chain is profitable, well regarded and loved by our loyal customers
and staff. However we have failed to gain the necessary support from major
stakeholders, suppliers and their credit insurers to generate sufficient working
capital to run our expanding business.

We would like to thank staff and customers for their support over the past 25
years'

ENDS

A fopp spokesperson


*****PLEASE NOTE*****

PRESS COUNSEL HAVE NO FURTHER COMMENT TO MAKE AND AS IT STANDS ARE NO LONGER IN
COMMUNICATION WITH FOPP

___________________________
Well that rather chuffs the idea of Bearded getting a distribution deal there. Where am I going to buy my mid-price books and similar when I can't be arsed to go on Amazon now? Also, what's going on with that Press Counsel statement? Either Fopp's totally disappeared off the radar or they haven't paid their PR bills. Crivens.

I am going to Glastonbury in less than four hours. Despite the fact I spent the entirety of last summer sleeping in fields accumulating a new and interesting collection of bruises, I am still not remotely prepared. I have to go and buy a tent at lunchtime. I texted my old housemate at midnight last night to ask if he could bring in my old sleeping bag (he is). My dad brought me my ancient wellies in exchange for tax forms and my mum smuggled me in some socks, which my dad then smuggled back on discovering they were his cherished sailing socks. I didn't say it was understandable or, y'know, fair.

Rather like illness or small yappy dogs, Glastonbury has always seemed to me like something that happens to other people. It's big, so obscenely big I can't even imagine. People put such emphasis on having life-changing experiences there that it's actually rather off-putting. It has a huge ethos with it. I know lots of people who are going, all of whom are scattered over 100 acres, which amounts to none. I can't remember what to take. I haven't got any binliners (shit – go and get bin liners). I was in shops buying sunglasses and belts this morning and a very exciting t-shirt and a very exciting short skirt for when I have to start using mud as leggings. I went to my friend Guy's end of year exhibition at St Martin's last night (moment for Guy – he's TOTALLY in Vogue) and after a couple of drinks went home to bake cake and make disappointingly unhippie fudge to share with the people sharing my camping bit.

I STILL DON'T HAVE A TENT.

Oh God, I don't have a tent. How much do they cost? There's a tent shop about 10 minutes from work. It shouldn't cost a load because I'll leave it for the charity appeal at the end of the weekend, but it shouldn't be shit because then the kids eventually using it will have to sleep in a fibrous sieve.

The tent still doesn't exist.

Trousers. Shall I wear my nice black trousers and get them fucked anyway, or just wear my least-favourite eBay purchase all weekend until it's destroyed (coffee-coloured ball dress, too long, deserves to die in a gasping flood of soil). Either way my tent will inevitably drown in a flood.

I almost forgot there was actual music until Olly emailed me for my number to make snap decisions on bands to see. Good grief. Bjork should be very good at least, and I am actually wetting myself at the prospect of seeing Burly Chassey roll those r's around Diamonds Are Forever.

Whinge whinge whinge. Glastonbury happens to other people. It had better happen to me when I get there. Whinge whinge ungrateful ingrate grating whinge. Bloody hell it's like being a toddler again. I'm going to two other festivals this summer which will be fine. Why this one? Nobody (touch wood) is going to rape me. Or steal from me. Or drown me in a vat of good feelings.

I will most likely come back going "Oh my God it was AMAZING." However. If I come back talking about ethics and hemp, please shoot me and scatter my ashes on AA Gill's doorstep.

*Inappropriate insertion of Emily Big Brother-esque joke about leaving job in Soho here*

I've been commissioned to write a blog about giving up smoking. This is obviously brilliant, as I am going to be paid to rant about the pointless minutiae of my life, but terrible in that I really like smoking and don't particularly want to stop.

Also, I've never tried giving up before unless I've had a really horrible hangover or been too ill to even consider the idea of putting anything other than Vicks near my lungs, so I don't really know what to do. I've joined my quitters' group at work (dreadful: I feel like I'm signing up to Pariahs Weekly) and I expect there will be patches and motivational talks, but other than that I'm a bit stumped as to how to behave in the pub, at gigs, drinking cocktails, at parties etc.

I don't smoke during the day but have an almost magnetic fixation to cigarettes when drinking/in pub/at gig/after screening/at friends' houses etc and I'm not stopping doing any of that thank you very much.

The ban, which this blog is in aid of, will be a help, but even worse, that means missing out on the gossip and camaraderie that goes on outside. Damn.

Swishblog Chris's lovely girlfriend Helen has talked about her London marching band on and off for a while now and I kept meaning to follow it up in the mindset of someone who won't because they think that potentially Helen is mad. Helen is clearly not mad, because it turns out her band do amazing things like this cover of Gravity's Rainbow by Klaxons. Sadly it doesn't have a video, but Helen has made a proper slide show to go with it and, frankly, if the sound of a marching band with full brass and the like rocking out to the UK's premier indie-not-dance band doesn't inspire you, then you're a bigger fool than I.

Normally I can count the press releases I get and actually care about on the bones of my little finger, so this was a really lovely treat in my inbox: Amiina, four nice young Icelandic girls who make lush and quirky music that sticks freakfolk in a bowl with a load of bass and fumbles it around awkwardly and probably with pom poms.

It doesn't make sense, it doesn't have to because it's LOVELY. I was slightly worried about not having anything to fall in love with this year, but with Lavender Diamond's album and this, I should be ok for the next few weeks at least.

Wibbles...

ohmygodbatmanohmygodbatmanohmygodbatman...




"Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?"

"Why no actually, I turned around and ran away in the opposite direction."

Who'da thunk this was Heath Ledger?

Three confusions: the unexpected fact that the last and very sad Ugly Betty I watched turned out to be the last one I get until the leaves start falling again; whether or not I fell asleep and forget about the little girl in Heroes; and Pirates 3, just in general.

It's released on Thursday, but the big media hoo-ha screening was only last night. Generally studios do this if a) the film is crap and they don't want the press flexing their vitriol much before release or b) the film is going to make squillions anyway and they don't need to care. This was a b moment, as made obvious by the bored-looking men standing around holding screens showing clips from the trilogy.

It was actually really nice to be able to walk into the Empire without having to hand over every electrical item in your bag and thus sharpen your elbows in preparation for the post-credits scrum later on. At the same time, it seemed curiously empty. Nobody was very excited, only a handful of people in the gigantic auditorium were wearing their Pirates bandannas, and expectations in the Empire camp were low to middling. Pirates 2 was smug and safe, in the way a lot of pictures get once the characters have their own action figures. Pirates 3 was...well, it's out in three days, you can see for yourself.

Having experienced the delights of a friend being blitzed by someone on the internet the other weekend, and then been slightly less delighted when I scrolled down to find that a bunch of his friends, me included, had been brought into the middle of it, it's only now that the whole sorry affair has been removed from the internet that I can snigger gleefully at this. Actually that's a flagrant lie, I'd have laughed anyway. Although I love paintball, and if my skin was tougher and I wasn't such a mimsying pansy I'd totally take it up professionally.

"So many memories, shared and archived…

…the day I met him, and I told all of you, “This could be THE one, or the NEXT one.”

…the night he proposed, and the morning he forgot he proposed.

…Great America… Hedonism II… Camping (I still have the scar!)… Meet the Parents (more scars, only on inside! LOL)… Hedonism III…

…the time he cheated on me with my own cousin but I forgave him because she had cancer and he was just making her feel good about herself but then it turned out she never had cancer and I still forgave him, even though a lot of you wrote a lot of thoughtful comments advising me not to."

"If anyone sees Dave, please inform him he owes me 32 thousand dollars."

Mother of god, I don't care that it's not real.

Also, some lessons in how not to make a flaming website. These include:

- Building it, and alternative flamers from your own IP address. If you're going to fork out for it yourself, you could at least sneak off to an internet cafe. Which brings us on to...

- Don't pay for it with your own credit card. Seriously, if you want revenge, at least plot it out properly. However outraged your friends are on your behalf, they need security details.

- Get your facts right. If half of it is going to be an anguished call of love, then putting in lies the (admittedly incredibly stupid) boy in question told one of your friends and calling them fact just makes you libellous.

- Don't put in stuff about their friends. Especially not if one of them is me and you've just written them an incredibly well thought out email explaining why you are not insane. Actions like this rather negate that.

- Spell and punctuate properly. Emotional turmoil is no excuse for abusing the lower case.

The thing that pisses me off most in the world, being wrong about people. Thank god I've got coffee.

I don't really think about withdrawal very much except in connection with a) my horrific overdraft b) nicotine and c) heroin. I don't do heroin. I'm not Socttish enough. I gave up chocolate for Lent when I was 16 and was so upset after two hours of the prospect of 30 days without it that I ate three Snickers.

Nobody likes withdrawal because it reminds us that we need stuff and that's wholly at odds with the idea of being free-thinking and choosing our own path down the yellow brick road. At the moment, I'm stuck slap-bang in the middle of chemical withdrawal and it fucking sucks. Rather than writing Trainspotting via Clapham ("We've run out of organic limes!") I would just like to warn you about something you probably know about already, being more interested in life/medicine/stuff that happens outside of fiction than me.

It's called Seroxat and it fucking sucks. Before I found this out, I thought it was called Paroxetine which it is, to give it its less glamorous Tesco's Value equivalent name. The three evils of job hunting, panicking about losing any grip on writing I'd made in the last two years and whether anyone would ever employ me for longer than 9 months made me even more anxious than usual, and given my brain had a tendency to self-destruct until three years ago, my doctor went all American and thrust pills at me, ones that incidentally have the highest incidence rate and severity of withdrawal of any similar pill. Like, score!

On Friday, after a month of numbness, yawning and general meh, the pills ran out. Yesterday I burst into tears within ten minutes of getting out of bed and didn't stop for 8 hours. I wrote a furious and outraged email to a friend that was way over the top however annoyed I was, and I haven't bothered checking my inbox to find her inevitably furious and outraged reply. My boyfriend thought he'd done something wrong, but nobody had – it was just my brain suddenly realising it wasn't being zapped into numbness by suicide-enhancing anti-anxiety tablets and throwing a massive wobbler in the process.

Today I just feel sick. The sort of sick where you can't see any way of getting through it because you're about to cry anyway. Everything is misted up in a grey veil of panic and upset, about absolutely nothing, about tears and the fact my head is being denied this horrendous drug. I've taken it for a month for fuck's sake, this is utterly absurd. There's a reason people go on this for so long: coming off it is exactly that – coming off. Ironic when none of the myriad tablets I was prescribed when I was actually ill did anything other than give me something to do every morning.

I absconded to BDQ headquarters in Windsor last night and for a blissful 12 hours felt safe and happy. Then I got the train home this morning and hid behind the Style section of the Sunday Times quaking in a hot puddle of saline surrounded by burly men and yummy mummies in Wasps shirts.

Depression isn't my illness anymore and hasn't been for years. I'm no happier or sadder than anyone else in London. What I am is at the mercy of my body, and it absolutely sucks. Screw Seroxat, Paroxetine, and doctors who'll throw drugs at anything that moves because the NHS gives them sod all support to do otherwise. Don't take this drug. Don't let anyone give it to you. Eat coconut and lemon meringue ice creams instead. And smile lovingly at your Pirates 3 screening ticket for tomorrow evening. Aces.

Best Holy Moly Duty Log ever...

(If you don't know what a duty log is, it's where Disgruntled from Lancaster write in to express their concerns with their television stations. Apparently. I'm sure people write in with praise as well, but it's considerably less fun.)

"My favourite programme on TV is and always has been Heartbeat. It's one of the few programmes I allow time for. THAT IS UNTIL NOW! 8.07pm I HAVE JUST SWITCHED OFF (AND WON'T BE SWITCHING BACK ON - I DO KNOW WHERE THE OFF BUTTON IS).

The reason I have switched off is the shooting and killing of the dog. We have two similar dog's and they both had seen the dog on the TV and were barking at it. My family were all laughing 'the dogs like the show too' we said.

Then a gunshot and the dog lay DEAD. My grandchildren who were watching started to cry and I switched the show off - FOREVER. AND IT WAS BEFORE THE 9PM WATERSHED.

Everyone connected with the show is a DISGRACE."

Thirteen pups for Beethoven! It's like 101 Dalmations, only marginally more physically possible. Bless. I want a puppy. Immediately.

Yawn. Patrick Wolf has changed his mind about retiring from music and is celebrating this fact by going on a massive tour just to show how not retiring he is. Good grief. If you want a publicity stunt he could have just slept with someone. Or worn a suit.

"For me to say I was going to quit music is like saying I'm going to commit suicide," he says. "It's the most extreme thing that could happen in my life." Bless the silly chump.

From Ananova via the DJourno:

"A TV worker has been sacked for mocking the French presidential favourite in English subtitles.

"A plea by Nicholas Sarkozy for voters to join his campaign before the Sunday poll was interpreted as "rally my inflated ego".

"The subtitles were broadcast across the United States in the English news bulletins from public broadcaster France 2.

"Channel chiefs blamed it on freelance workers."

Hilarious. I'm waiting to be paid by a firm based in Spain. Apparently Spain works several weeks behind the actual world, so I sympathise with freelancers who are bored out of their wits, and rather admire their ability to crowbar a joke anywhere near the region of Sarkozy, a man who probably had a sense of humour once but decided it was spoiling the lines of his suit.

I admire anyone who has actually managed to hold on to their languages. I had to interview Marion Cotillard from the excellent Edith Piaf biog La Vie En Rose on Monday and having spoken to the PR in French had a mad crazy panic when asked if I wanted to do the interview in French.

Waiting for the next (ludicrously supercilious) PR to get her, I had horrible flashbacks to what happened when I interviewed Daniel Auteuil in French at the Hidden LFF screening. I was so nervous that I not only got my words the wrong way round but made an enormous clanger caused by having missed the only screening that week. There is no scorn like Gallic scorn or worse, pitying scorn.

Technically, I have half a degree in French. It shouldn't be a problem but for the fact that it's a degree I got three years ago, I've spoken French about six times since and mostly in Beaujolais on Litchfield Street asking what wine they'd recommend to cheer up the sad person sitting next to me.

Beaujolais is a happy place, the flipside to Ed's Diner where only bad things seem to happen to the people who end up eating their grotesquely smiley burgers. I took my dad to Beaujolais last night: it's packed full of oddly-shaped tables that don't quite fit, has ties dangling from the ceiling, blues blaring out of the speakers, over-priced bar snacks, a massive cellar, assorted cheery Frenchmen hanging around the bar and an incredibly vivacious manager who waves you off to your seat to "Rrrrrelax!" while he brings your your bill.

We had a bottle of Fleury and chatted over cigarettes and pistachios. I realised a couple of months ago that a half hour phone conversation in February was our first proper chat in about five years. My dad is brilliant and it was lovely to hang out with him, more so now that I am no longer a Vile Teenager and can actually hold a conversation without blaming my parents for something.

I nipped off to the shop to get some Sluts (Silk Cuts rather than Charing X giftshop) and was chatted up by the smooth operator behind the checkout. "Are you drinking next door? Are you drinking with your friends?" he asked.

"No, with my dad," I smiled sweetly, walking out the door. You never saw a face fall so hard.

Great piece on the BBC: French voting turn out is in the 80%s - in the estates as well as nationally, and more and more young people are voting. Depressing to think that's never the same over here, even more depressing to think I've been so focused on France I totally forgot about local elections over here. I have a horrible feeling I'm still registered in Wales...

New Harry Potter in trailer in not looking shit shocker. The Phoenix was such a lumbering dreadful disappointment that it'll be a relief for it to be slashed down into less than three hours. I'm getting excited now: last book, new film. Amazing.

Patrick Wolf's live show at the Astoria was one of my favourite things about the 11th April, but mostly of this year. So it kind of sucks that he doesn't love the press trail that goes along with music and has decided to quit (although he'll still be playing Latitude, hurrah.)

He says...

"I don't think when I was 16 and dreamt of releasing records there would ever be so much crazy speculation about the person I am and what you want me to be.

"I have become so tired of this behaviour, sometimes I wake up and have to do six hours of interviews before doing a show, then go straight to bed to sleep a couple of hours then fly to a new country to be cross-examined in the same way...I don't know what is left of me".

He adds:

"I have made a decision, my final concert will be this November, a retrospective with an orchestra in London.

"I am not sure whether there will be anymore public communications after that, in fact I am pretty sure there will be none.

"Of course, this has nothing to do with my drummer, but a creative clock is ticking and I have many many projects to be creating with my time left on this earth. I hope to share my last shows with you this year".

Hmph.

Why didn't I have a birthday party like this? It was clearly invented just for me.

"Our parties are recommended for children ages 4-13, but emotionally stunted 24-yera-olds are given priority."

I'm going to be in a play on the Edinburgh Fringe this summer.

Blonde Drama Queen texted me a couple of weeks ago to see how much holiday I could feasibly take off without getting fired.

"We're going to do W;t. Come and do it with us." she said. It's a play about a social rockface called Dr Vivian Bearing who analyses her horrific cancer treatment in much the same way as she analyses John Donne poems until it all becomes too much. It's funnier than it sounds, although it clearly doesn't end well. I played her in my last year at Durham and it was amazing.

BDQ made a "serious offer" today, which given my flathunting of late makes me feel like I'm a house. Maybe a maisonette. Or a duplex penthouse apartment overlooking the Spitz.

Other than saying "like, duh" I don't quite know what to say really because I'm actually really nervous. I'm nervous because I've only done two versions of the same play once before, for that time in Edinburgh, and then there was only a three month gap between goes. This one has a totally different cast, a sporadic rehearsal schedule and I'm worried about fucking up, partly because it's very affecting, partly because Vivian doesn't leave the stage, and partly because I'm worried about doing something retarded in front of BDQ's beady-eyed cast from Eton.

"Old Etonians I hope," said Opera Cat, who's singing at the grown-up International Festival around the same time.

"No. Proper little ones." I'm the token old person who's been wheeled in because 50's pushing it for a 16-year-old. Also, technically everyone is little to me.

"This is like your Mrs Robinson moment," she helpfully pointed out. "Only Benjamin's richer than you are."

"Awesome. So if I fuck up that's in front of someone who could buy me in 10 years time?"

"Well look on the bright side. You could end up staying in the castle."

Sheryl Crow, a woman with presumably the tightest sphincter this side of space, has turned her attention to stopping global warming by telling us to use less bog roll. Rather than foisting horribly smug charity concerts on us, she plans to restrict the amount of toilet paper people use, although quite what that's got to do with carbon footprints and fossil fuels escapes me.

She says, "Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating," (like, duh Sheryl Crow, if you don't think that who the hell else is going to?) "I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting."

Under the Crow regime you'll be allowed "only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where two to three could be required". This had better be Andrex Triple Quilted otherwise that's not just pesky but bordering on masochism. How does she plan to do this monitoring? Someone send her a copy of Monkey Dust for tips.

Paper napkins are also on Sheryl Crow's hitlist as the "height of wastefulness", so just to show how cross she is, she's designed some clothes in protest (Sleb dating forms must run along the lines of design clothes, stop poverty/global warming/orphan crisis.) They have a detachable dining sleeve which can be replaced after you've wiped your mouth after eating. Is this not the most repellent thing ever? Apart from the fact you're essentially a step away from sitting back in a high chair, it's quite hard to get a good clean grasp on your sleeve and do it without making everyone at your table feel a bit ill.

Bad Sheryl Crow. Bad.

Sheryl Crow, presumably with the tightest sphincter this side of space, appears to have got bored of failing to write any more songs and turned her attention to stopping global warming by telling us to use less bog roll. Rather than foisting horribly smug charity concerts on us, she plans to restrict the amount of toilet paper people use, although quite what that's got to do with carbon footprints and fossil fuels escapes me.

She says, "Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating," (like, duh Sheryl Crow, if you don't think that who the hell else is going to?) "I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting."

Under the Crow regime you'll be allowed "only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where two to three could be required". This had better be Andrex Triple Quilted otherwise that's not just pesky but bordering on masochism. How does she plan to do this monitoring? Someone send her a copy of Monkey Dust for tips.

Paper napkins are also on Sheryl Crow's hitlist as the "height of wastefulness", so just to show how cross she is, she's designed some clothes in protest. They have a detachable dining sleeve which can be replaced after you've wiped your mouth after eating. Is this not the most repellent thing ever? Apart from the fact you're essentially a step away from sitting back in a high chair, it's quite hard to get a good clean grasp on your sleeve and do it without making everyone at your table feel a bit ill.

Bad Sheryl Crow. Bad.

I've no idea what this is, other than lyrics to a song a friend of mine is using to make her mind work better and transport her back to being 15. It mostly transports me back to feeling useless and panicked at university about the unlikelihood of my ever doing anything with my life, failing my degree, and ending up living in a gutter because I'd get thrown out of everywhere else. Which is cheering. Anyway. It reminds me of things being far more clear-cut. You know when you think that the world only existed in black and white and the shades of grey that my friends and I had battled out over drink and endless, stretching time. It didn't feel like it was endless though, things never do: rather like standing on a treadmill and watching the bit where you drop off coming closer. It's nearly summer now which always reminds me of being at university, idling around doing a play, singing, going for picnics and late-night jaunts. Happy, but terrified at the same time.

Kick the sheets off get out of bed
Good morning, de ja vu
Is this the best thing in my head?
Good morning, now what to do
Look at my day
What's the first appointment?
Lunch in heaven
What a disappointment

I could run away with Captain Courageous
I could live on fruit in Montego Bay
I could run a bar in a war torn front line
I could do it all
But just not today

Good morning T.V what's been said
Around the world whilst I'm in bed
Nothing changes cos we're still being fed
On little white lies and stale white bread

The latest soap show misery
Four hours, every day
I live for them and they live for me
For hours and hours every day

I could free my mind
become a rich man's guru
I could take the time just to feed the world
I could drink all day until I find all the answers
I could do it all
But just not today .....

I meant to mention this yesterday - some fucking fuckers are planning on closing down The Spitz.

This is rubbish.

I've seen some of my favourite people play some of my favourite gigs there, and been introduced to some of the worst support acts ever along with some of the best.

If you're remotely bothered, sign a petition. It probably won't do shit, but if people can get het up about the Astoria, they should certainly get het up about The Spitz.

Gumtree's opened up a whole load of new sections for people who can't find a flat/job/fuckbuddy to waste time on while praying for the fjb to materialise. It includes a thank you section which seems to be a place for people to vent ("St Thomas's Hospital is corrupt! If you're a journalist email me for the truth!") or write little private messages ("Thank you for last night. It was amazing.") and also to write little secrets that nobody will ever find. It's like postsecret all over again, an old curiosity shop filled with the spillings from people's lives. Like this one for instance.

"Thank you Maria for who you are! Thanks for being such a great, lively, friendly person. Thank you for the beauty and warmth you spread around! Your friends all adore you so much! and your smile is the most beautiful thing I have seen.
You take my breath away every time I see you. I can't speak my mind when I am near you - being close to you always makes me a bit shy and wish I could be more assertive with you. But I wish you liked me more. Thank you for allowing me to be your friend .....

I wish I could tell you how much I love you."

Dr David Lewis, formerly of the University of Sussex, and now of the Mind Lab, and most definitely of the “I’m never getting laid again” brigade, has done some research, probably to prove to women that men really are wholly unnecessary and there’s no need to get your legs waxed when you can buy a better snog from a machine.

Unsurprisingly, this essential study was funded by members of the food industry, although nobody’s owned up to forking out, although a MASSIVE clue comes from the chocolate they used was a new dark chocolate from Cadbury’s, so expect that to turn up in an ad campaign soon. It’s a crying shame that dark chocolate is hideous and vile because it is apparently quite good for you: my heart rate would probably go up in leaps and bounds too once I’d realised what I’d just eaten, shortly before washing my mouth out with bleach.

"There is no doubt that chocolate beats kissing hands down when it comes to providing a long-lasting body and brain buzz,” said Dr Lewis, who got a load of 20-somethings to melt chocolate in their mouths and then kiss which seems a bit messy, although also the best thing in the world EVER.

Of course chocolate is better than kissing, it’s utterly selfish. It’s delectably, thrillingly egotistical. You can break a piece off and give it to someone as a cursory wave towards the concept of sharing, but only you decide how much to eat of it and when. It’s up to you whether you mechanically munch your way through, or whether you press it against the roof of your mouth and suck off the layers one by one until your jaws are coated in luscious fragments of goo. You get the breaking waves of goodness smoking their way into your serotonin receptors. Cor…

Still, unless you’re in 9 and a half Weeks, you don’t generally share chocolate with people in the way you do kissing. Passing a box of Roses around the room doesn’t quite have the same frisson as curling your tongue around the inside of someone’s upper lip (unless it’s a seriously good praline in which case kissing be damned).

Although the study found that kissing raised the heartbeat, the chocolate increased heart rates more from a resting rate of about 60 beats per minute to 140. When you bear in mind that the volunteers were standing in a lab wearing electrodes attached to their skulls, and heart monitors, they’re probably going to be scared out of their wits. I’ve had electrodes on my head before and it makes you feel like Frankenstein about to sit an exam. I reckon the volunteers stressed out a bit about not getting the right result that the excitement of finally being on the test made their heart rates soar, and then getting the kissing afterwards calmed them down a bit. Either that or they were too busy concentrating on getting the chocolate off each other’s teeth to notice that their heart rates had stopped doing the tango. Funny that they don’t mention the exact results of the kissing except to say chocolate did better…

I’ve tried giving up chocolate for Lent a few times, and other than the fact I waved goodbye to the Church when I was 9 and therefore have little interest in keeping my distinctly grubby Lenten vows, it didn’t work because I love eating chocolate and have an acrimonious relationship with self-restraint.

The Cadbury’s sponsored-advert of my life will go as follows. I will be played by Julia Stiles( who will be flawlessly attired in a Petite Salope dress and Chanel accessories._

It’s Sunday. Kat (played by Julia Stiles) lies curled up on the sofa with the papers. The delicate tendrils of a Cadbury’s Picnic unfurl in her mouth. She probably makes a Bisto face.

CUT TO

Summer. SFX: The hollow ‘click’ of a barky strip of Magnum breaking off and girl then curling her upper lip around it to stop it falling down her front and making her look like messy toddler.

CUT TO

Most days in Autumn. K (pbJS) making a really gorgeous chocolate sauce and pouring it onto ice cream, then mushing it all up. Or not. Depending.

CUT TO

Cake.

CUT TO

Maltesers Easter Eggs: that lovely cloying malty chocolate in a whole egg. If you haven’t ever had one, you haven’t truly eaten chocolate. Fuck what Europe says, I like “family” milk chocolate. Cocoa content be damned.

CUT TO

Cake, also, éclairs.

CUT TO

Mavericks. Chocolate you can’t get anymore. Guerilla chocolate.

CUT TO

The massive chocolate montage. There will be a tap dance, chorus girls in a can-can line, a large pond and unleashing of doves and it will climax with everyone stringing up Johnny Depp and Gene Wilder and setting the original Roald Dahl free.

ENDS.

(No, not quite ends. There needs to be a kiss at the end, and one that makes K (pbJS) heart go significantly above 140bpm.)

That’s better.

ENDS.

I got an email from someone at Surrey university a week ago. If this was you, could you email me again as I forgot to put it into my inbox and junk's deleted it, sorry.

What I did on my holidays: got drunk mostly. And threw sticks down a very steep hill for my parents’ ridiculously over-excited dog while my mum and I sat down and soaked up spring sun.

Last week I went on holiday to Brighton sort of by accident as I’d got fed up of thinking up fun things to do and failing, and so instructed someone else to do it instead. Skirting past the surprise grannies and our general poverty it was utterly, utterly wonderful. Why haven’t I been to Brighton before? Well it’s quite far away, and I have one a bit nearer. A beach, not a Brighton. Brighton is amazing.

I drank Champagne on the beach, sifting the pebbles with my feet. I went paddling, and soon regretted that fact once the charm had worn off and I had to hobble back up cascading stones to my cigarettes. I ate a whelk (or a cockle, they both look like sticky sponge) and it wasn’t disgusting. I bought ice cream off a French man, and walked along the beachfront at night. I was spun around like a gangly carousel, and drank Old Orleans cocktails like I did when I was 17.

It was brilliant.

Later that week I got very, very drunk. Childishly, university drunk, the sort of drunk where you play pool at 3 in the afternoon and can barely see to do so because someone called Harry has just given you sambuca. I even had cocktails, bonding with my brother’s housemate in a ludicrously over-priced faux-Indian bar called Mint Leaf run almost exclusively by thickly-tongued Russians. We discussed the seemingly endless merits of Jilly Cooper and decided that Wicked was probably a recycling too far. There’s only so much sex you can have where you plunge in joyous as an otter, and seeing as Rupert Campbell-Black is pushing 60 I very much doubt he’s still Mecca to most women. Gold diggers, probably.

Falling back to Hampshire, my brother and I had a drink in the eye-gougingly awful Reef bar at Waterloo. If you haven’t had the misfortune of being drunk and thus unable to spend half an hour in Smiths instead, Reef is the sort of place where alcoholics get priests to bless their gin beforehand in case of unwanted reprisals from the dark side.

Peering over the balcony I saw Camilla Batman-Ghelidja below: she’s fairly impossible to miss because she generally wears a colourful kaftan and matching turban. She is also one of my very few dead cert heroes. I flung myself down the stairs and went starstruck. She was lovely and said “wicked” (Jilly would be proud and probably put her in her next book verbatim). I went back upstairs in a total haze and spent the next ten minutes trying to explain to my brother why that was probably the coolest thing that would happen to me this year.

I have no idea how to pronounce Ghelidja, so isn’t it rather wonderful that today’s Mother Theresa is basically Camilla Batman?

Let us now play the first line of article Kat is writing game.

“Until last week I thought that the most exciting thing that would happen to me and a lift would be if the Diet Coke man stepped out of it. How wrong I was!”

Guess what comes next. I dare you. Clue: it doesn’t involve sex or the Diet Coke man.

It’s a bit odd to be at a new job now, having been somewhere else for two years. Sort of lonely. Still, nothing the Edith Piaf film and a trip to Patrick Wolf can’t temporarily sellotape together.