No work for me today - I'm off to Wales!

It will be nice to get away, it feels like life has really closed in around me this winter, my world seems so much smaller! I feel like I've lost the knack of going out and being sociable, which is not good at all! So I'm hoping a few hills and some Welsh cakes will put me back together again.

See you Monday! xx

This past week I've been absolutely gripped by the controversy created by a book called The Lost Child, in which the writer Julie Myserson writes about throwing her teenage son out of the house when his use of cannabis gets out of control.

It's been one of those moments where something that might usually have got a small mention on the Arts pages has mysteriously gone overground and is making headlines and causing huge amounts of fuss. The Daily Mail in particular is loving it, going so far as to side with a cannabis smoking teenager - who they would usually despise - so they can lay into his liberal parents - who they despise even more - it's that whole my enemies enemy is my friend kind of thing.

I haven't read any of her work and only vaguely know her name, and if pushed would have said she wrote chick-lit, but now I'm gripped! Once I'd started to read about it the first thing that occurred to me was how similar it seemed to a column that used to run in the Family section of the Guardian on Saturdays, called Living with Teenagers. To start with I hated the idea of the Family section, as if the whole world didn't revolve around families already without them taking hold of the only newspaper I can bear to read! But thanks mostly to this column I came to accept it, and after the magazine it's the second section I always read. So I Googled her name and the column and drew a blank, apart from a solitary woman on mumsnet (of all places!) who suggested it but no one would take seriously. Turns out we were right!

I'm now so gripped I've ordered one of here previous books to help me decide if she's just doing her best with a bad situation or in fact a monster as some people claim. What excites me about the whole thing is the way that it proves to people who claim that anything cultural, which would include books, is elitist and pointless, and yet here is something that is not only completely current but is also making the news!

I feel a lot of sympathy for the women. This may just be because the Daily Mail hates her - my enemies enemy is my friend again? - but I can't help thinking there's a lot of hypocrisy and nonsense involved in the fuss. If a vicar's wife from Buckinghamshire had been forced to do the same thing I'm sure the papers would be blaming Social Services and teachers for failing her, but because the author is a Guardian reading leftie it's all her fault, and what a shocking thing to do to the poor child!

As for the poor child, he's bigger than her and apparently perforated her eardrum by hitting her, then took £1000 from her for letting her use some of his poems in the book he claims he never wanted her to publish. He's clearly got problems, but I'm struggling to find any sympathy for him!

And isn't it a little naive to think that writers never write about their own lives?!

Disappointingly there have been no new developments today, although I've been looking obsessively....

Hello lovelies! It's been a bit mad here, and not in a good way. I wish I could tell you it's been a social whirl, but it's just work. Is it the law that as soon as you plan to have longer than ten minutes out of the office everything needs doing immediately? There were times today when I wanted to hide under the desk, but instead I just swore at people and frowned. Hey it works for me!

It makes me more determined to have a proper holiday this year. Last year I had lots of weekends away, which were great, but the only time I got a whole week off was at Christmas which is hardly the time to enjoy it. But I'm struggling to get my act together! It's hard to imagine that three years ago I went to New York on my own and thought nothing of it. I wonder what happened to the me that was able to do that? Somehow I don't think I'll find him in the bar of Fruit & Nut I'm eating...

Last night the 24 year old and I went to see Bjorn Again, the ABBA tribute act. It was his idea and I thought why not?! I'd seen them before so might not have gone to see them again but I'm glad I did because it turned out to be a really fun night!

Bizarrely I got to meet some of the people he works with, which is a bit like meeting the family, only they think we're just friends and don't know that I'm helping him cheat on his boyfriend. Probably just as well! But it was a bit odd...

Bjorn Again were of course fantastic! How could they not be - a whole evening of ABBA songs, just the hits - heaven! It was great fun and the crowd was up for it and we danced our way through the second half. I'd forgotten how silly some of the early songs are and how sad the later songs are: Our last summer nearly had me in tears! I realised just how many of their songs are love songs and it would have been great to have gone with someone I love so I could have held their hand and had a little tear.

Afterwards we went to a pub for a drink, and it was nice to sit and chat. I almost wish he'd been able to come back home with me. It was nice to be in a pub - I can't remember the last time I did that! He clearly had a good time too as his Facebook status now reads "****** **** wants every night to be like last night!" Heavens!

Random ABBA memories:

Last time I saw Bjorn Again was in the same place, about ten years ago, with someone I briefly went out with who shared the same name as the 24 year old - Groundhog Day!

I've only ever sung in public once in my life, when I was at primary school. Each year all the schools in the area would gather together in the town hall and perform. Our school sent a choir and some recorder players - I was in the choir. Clearly before my voice broke I had a voice that could be heard in public! We sang ABBA's Thank you for the music although I remember being completely gutted when only the girls were allowed to sing the line, "I am the girl with golden hair" - see, I was always gay!

They don't make writers like Joe Orton any more, which is why they're still reviving his plays forty years after they were first performed.

Last night I was in London to see Entertaining Mr Sloane which has been getting great reviews thanks to a combination of the magnificent Imelda Staunton and Matthew Horne, who is making the most of his popularity after Gavin & Stacey.

It's one of only three full length plays Joe Orton wrote before he was murdered by his partner and it's the only one of them I've never seen. There's a film version starring Beryl Reid which didn't really work for me as they chopped the text about and the central character wears caramel coloured leather, which is surely an abomination!

It's about a woman who takes in a young man as a lodger, who is then employed by her brother and accidentally kills their father. The play ends with her expecting his child and agreeing to share him with her brother. It's a black comedy obviously, although some of it has lost its comedy with age and is now just savage and cruel.

Imelda Staunton is of course fantastic! You can really tell when you're watching someone who really knows what they're doing, and she makes the slightly unbelievable character really human, which is tricky when wearing a see-through negligee! The actors playing her brother and father are also excellent. The weak link is Matthew Horne - he has little stage experience and it shows. The main character is supposed to be incredibly sexual, so much so that neither men nor women can resist him - Matthew Horne isn't the slightest bit sexual! He does the creepy, violent side well, but honestly I couldn't imagine him having sex with anyone! It doesn't help that he has bad hair and seems to be doing, intermittently, a Birmingham accent for no apparent reason. That aside it was great to see the play on stage at last, and in a small theatre - just 380 seats.

It was part of my New Year plan to see a piece of theatre in London every month. So far I've succeeded but I fear the odds may be against me! I'm trying to find something for May and am slightly scandalised by the prices - I want to see A Little Night Music, because I've seen very little Stephen Sondheim, but the cheapest seats only give restricted views and the lowest price seats where you can actually see everything are £50! But that's not as bad as the new Priscilla Queen of the Desert musical, where top price seats are £64 although there are special VIP seats at £92! Recession anyone?


On the train on the way home a ginger haired man sat next to me, and inevitably reminded me of Ken. Remember him? But for one slightly mad moment I thought he was actually him - there was something about the way he used his left hand to operate his iphone that was so familiar I nearly couldn't breathe!


Back in Downham I wandered up from the station, which is always a bit challenging as by that time people are leaving the pubs and trouble is brewing. A woman stumbled out of an alley, buttoning her trousers up, and as I walked past her she turned back to talk to the man she was with, who was slouched against the wall having a piss - welcome home!


But it gets worse: at 4am the neighbours start screaming at each other and throwing things. This happens regularly enough for me to just turn over and sleep through it. But after an hour I'd had enough and phoned the police. Two police cars turned up and it's been silent ever since. I wish they'd move! I'm a bit worried they'll realise it was me who phoned the police and give me trouble. Perhaps I should have just let them kill each other...