Thursday 27th August 2015

Wednesday.

50 years plus one day.

Situation normal. Yes, here I am working from home once more. Back in the distant past, after a birthday, let alone a significant one, I would be waking up with a hangover. But seeing as I went to bed having supped just two pints in the evening, I was as right as rain, and fighting fit. Jools and I drink coffee before she gets ready to drive to work, and I make ready for my second coffee and think about getting dressed.

Is it autumn already? I ask this as for the second day in a row, the rain falls from the sky like a waterfall. The cats have breakfast then sleep through until half four, at which point, of course, they are demanding food. Of course they are. I spend the day working at the computer, and in the fallow periods make a batch of focaccia bread to go with the insalata caprese we are going to have for dinner. Soon the smell of the garlic and proving bread is filling the house.

Being at home, I can listen to a lot of radio, and by lunchtime I had listened to Tuesday's Radcliffe and Maconie show, including my namecheck: I had written in to the show the morning of my birthday asking for a record to be played. And then forgot. Only to be tweeted by my friend Sami that the radio had just birthday checked me, and how awesome it was hearing the name of someone she knew being said.

The rain continues to hammer down all afternoon, in a break in it, I gather a handful of raspberries and with blueberries, banana and leftover grapes make a smoothie. Makes a change from the grapefruit segments which is my usual fruit of choice, this seems like a luxury.

In the evening the rain does clear, but seems way too cold to be sitting outside on the patio. Overhead the three-quarter full moon shines down through fast moving veils of cloud. And on the radio we listen to Man Utd score four and enter the promised land of the CL group stage.

And that was it, really. Another day, another dollar.