Book One: Chapter 40

Friday 3rd February

In the morning we go to revisit our prospective new house to measure up fixtures and fittings. I have to say, we were expecting it to have lost its allure, but if anything the garden seems prettier than it was, whilst the kitchen less small.
God, please let nothing go wrong. Please?

Saturday 4th February

Nothing happens this weekend, save for packing the flat for our intended move. The highlight of the day is procuring some cardboard boxes at the Big Yellow Storage depot where counterfeit notes and dead bodies are stored by South London's less desirable citizens. Upon returning home I commence packing by clearing out my late grandmother's bureau that is home to a forest of paper, including bills from the late-1990's, a zillion negatives and a 1960's road map of Southend-on-Sea. Its amazing how much crap you accummulate in a short space of time, even more amazing how you still pack it neatly into a cardboard box which you might as well label "crap".

The first thing that I pack is actually my daughter, who climbs into a box, ready to be sent off to her new abode. I consider whether I should packs some victuals, a rusk and something rubbery to chew on, then post it to a random address to what happens. I punch some air-holes in the top (I am not inhumane) and get as far as West Norwood sorting office. But I have a last minute change of heart. She could be useful one day and I would feel pangs of guilt every time the child allowance cheques arrives.

In the evening I open a bottle of Cheval Blanc 1981 for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Monday 6th February

Buy three albums: Belle & Sebastian's "A Life Pursuit" (very good), The Sparks' "Hello Young Lovers" and Soft Cell's seminal "Non-Stop Erotic Dancing" (primarily for the extended version of "Insecure Me?", one of the greatest b-sides of all time.)

Tuesday 7th February

Gosset tasting at BAFTA House, presided over by a large black and white portrait of Dame David Lean. I am feeling under the weather, plough through some lovely old vintages of champagne back to 1979, then perhaps for the first time ever, eschew a free lunch so I can recuperate back at the office. Manflu ahoy.

Wednesday 8th February

Lunch with a colleague who I will affectionately bestow the sobriquet "G&T". We eat in the chichi surroundings of China Tang in the Dorchester Hotel, whose opulent Oriental interior is ruined by audio recordings of odious Radio One DJ, Mike Read, reciting poetry in the Mens lavatories.
Whose idea?
Is this supposed to represent a quasi-post modernist existential furnishing to one's ablutions, or is Mike Read a demi-God in China? Still, the Morey-Saint-Denis 2000 from Domaine Dujac is splendid if certainly fully-mature, whilst the dim sum is better than the Golden Gate's in West Norwood High Street.

Thursday 9th February

Today is the auspicious Domaine de la Romanee-Conti tasting at Corney & Barrow.

Straight after the tasting I receive some devastating news. Days before we are due to exchange contracts on my house, my spineless buyer has changed her mind and decided withdraw her offer, leaving several families hopes and expectations in tatters. It is not the practical implications that are so stressful, but the mental. We were all set to move, boxes packed. Moreover, Lily is confined to sleeping in the boiler room and generally having nowhere to crawl: a goldfish imprisoned in a tiny bowl. So thanks dear purchaser, you made a lot of people, very very miserable.

Friday 10th February

Morning spent trying to piece together my life, but to no avail. Does anyone want to buy our flat in West Norwood? It has a nice wine cellar.

Saturday 11th February

Wake up feeling as miserable as a chateau owner whose wine has just received 58-points from Robert Parker. I take Lily to the swings in the morning: her smile as infectious as ever, blissfully unaware of the traumas her parents are facing.

In the evening, we put our woes to one side as Tomoko has made me a birthday-eve dinner of roast duck with redcurrant sauce: absolutely delicious. A very fine wine is required to complement the cuisine and it does not come much finer than a stunning Chateau Trotanoy 1971, which dare I say is even better than the Chateau Petrus 1971 tasted late last year. Afterwards we watch the rather insipid "My Big Fat Greek Wedding".

Sunday 12th February

Today is my birthday. I am the same age as last night's Pomerol. But to be honest, for the first time in my life I am in no mood to celebrate and the dearth of cards indicates a man who has been incommunicado in recent weeks because of the stress caused by the arcane laws this country has apropos moving house. However, Tomoko buys me a lovely Paul Smith track-suit top and rather than staying at home and dreaming up ways of committing joint-suicide, we drive to "Royal China" for some exquisite dim sum. We get there early: even by 11.30am the place is virtually full with hungry early morning diners, along with a nursery load of babies. The food relieves our despondency and after dropping in at Tomoko's friend in Chelsea, we drive home.

In the evening I meet up with my brother in Brixton and witness what I have to say is one of the best concerts I have ever seen: Goldfrapp. Usually I get a bit fidgety during even my favourite bands, but Goldfrapp commence with a spell-binding "Utopia" and it just never lets up from thereon in. Watching Alison Goldfrapp appear to violently masturbate some kind of theremin is a little disturbing, whilst the quartet of bikini-clad dancers with wolves heads is not the thing one usually sees on a Sunday evening. The whole burlesque gig is a cathedral of sound, pulsating electro with one common theme: sex. Just utterly, utterly brilliant and for a moment I forget my troubles.

Monday 13th February

Aarrgh. Sometimes, no make that most times, this poor excuse for a country drives you up the wall.

All I want to do is develop a 35mm camera film with a copy on CD. I enter a small branch of Boots, located in the ant colony that is Victoria Station and approach the pharmacy counter. The warning signs are already visible on the assistant's (and I use that word in the loosest terms) face: a vacant, vague look that changes to utter panic as he realises that I am going to request something technical, rather than asking for a small pack of Anadin Extra.

I politely ask for the film to be developed and he looks at me as if I am speaking in tongues or just descended from Mars. In fact if I went to Mars I could probably get this bloody film developed quicker. As his life crumbles around him, he starts filling in the form, ticking 2-times extra prints, extra-large photos, photos to be sent to Outer Mongolia and so on. I ask him to stop but he appears to be on a mission, a voice in his head instructing him to do as he will. His exasperated superior intervenes and grabs the pen out of his sweaty palm: this simple chore takes about ten, teeth-pulling minutes. No wonder everyone now develops their digital photos at home, or at least leaves them on the hard-drive until they spill coffee on the computer and lose them forever.

Tuesday 14th February

Valentine's Day. I pop in to Clinton's cards after KFC, seek a card that strikes a balance between gushing proclamations of love and long-term relationship diffidence, plus one that costs less than £1.99. Perhaps next year I will just give her the £1.99 instead? Yes, I am a closet romantic.

Friday 17th February

Pop in to Rough Trade Records looking for February's Album of the Month. I descend down the vertiginous spiral staircase to the vinyl emporium below, which today seems to be populated by patchouli smelling acoustic, folk-musos waiting patiently for an in-store gig by some hippy chanteuse who has listened to far too many Joan Baez records. I grab some discs and play them on the in-house CD player, adjust the volume control that inexplicably has no effect (turns out I am adjusting the volume on the Technic 1210's and annoying the hell out of a dread-locked Japanese dude who is too embarrassed to protest.) I leave empty-handed: nothing smacks me round the chops and yells "I Am Your Record."

Saturday 18th February

Whilst Tomoko and I revel in our house-moving despondency and exctricate ourselves from all forms of socializing, Saturday seems to have fallen in to a routine, one might say a mundane routine. Shopping at Sainsbury's in the morning, home via superlative butchers "William Rose" in East Dulwich with its customary mile-long queue of carnivorous shoppers, Jonathan Woss on Radio 2, tea and cake at noon then in my best estranged father impersonation, I take Lily to the swings in the afternoon, followed by a circular drive tuned in to Kenny Sansom on LBC frothing about the footie while Lily enjoys her siesta.

I have discovered that a children's playground reflects the socio-economic make-up of its environs perfectly. Dulwich Park throngs with couples: he a City banker, she a parochial philanthropic housewife with a penchant for Prada and Jimmy Choo, angelic kids attired in the latest 5-7 year old haute couture, carbon-fibre prams. Crystal Palace Park near Sydenham is very different: clothes from TK Maxx, roll-up fags, a smattering of single parents and the odd outbreak of violence between boys (sometimes girls). Still, the kids seem equally happy in both.

In the evening I cook a chicken chasseur along with a bottle of Chateau Palmer 1989 (still too young, me thinks.)

Sunday 19th February

Cold, rainy and it's Sunday. Only one option: Bluewater shopping centre. The shopping is fine, although I take a wrong turning on the M25 and end up driving into the middle of Kent. Still, the 20-mile diversion allows Lily a little relaxation time in the car-seat.

Monday 20th February

A moment analagous to the famous primate scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey when the monkeys discover that big bar of chocolate standing upright in the desert.

Lily is watching the Simpsons and points to Homer on the screen.
"Dadda" she says in the cutest voice possible to imagine.
I am overcome and open a can of Duff to celebrate.

Monday 21st February

Linden has a masochistic bent for Madeira as I attend his third in a twelve months, this time a Bual vertical back to 1895. I am feeling rather enervated, I partake less in discussion that usual. I need a holiday. I need to bloody move house. I need a housekeeper. I am very, very tired. Still Barbeito's Bual 1895 revivifies the metabolism to a degree.

In the evening, Tomoko and I settle down to watch superlative cop/time-travel series "Life On Mars". A classic.

Wednesday 22nd February

I don a suit to re-enter the Travellers' Club in aristocratic Pall Mall. The doorman politely informs me that the tasting was yesterday. Bugger.

Thursday 23rd February

I stand guilty of debasing my wife's televisual viewing. When we first met, she would watch intelligent programs and would balk at reality TV. But with tonights return of "The Apprentice" on BBC2, her degeneration towards her husband's televisual fodder is virtually complete since I have already debased her evening entertainment with "Holiday Showdown" and "Brat Camp", indeed, any program that gets onto the front cover of Heat magazine. Fortunately, we have not stooped so low as "Strictly Come Dancing" and "Dancing On Ice". But perhaps it is only a matter of time.

Friday 24th February

Hoorah - I have been ordained with a new computer at work, one without a screen that burns the retinas within three minutes. Whilst it is being fixed, I pop round to the opticians for an eye-test to see whether the damage is permanent. They perform a test beforehand, blowing a jet of air onto the eyeball. I warn the optometrist that I am not very good with anything coming into contact with my delicate eyes, but she is still surprised when I jump out of my seat everytime that jet blinds me for a second. Is there a point to this exercise, or are they just having a bit of a laugh?

I quite enjoy eye-tests, though I am never sure whether one is supposed to read the letters that are perfectly clear, or whether the challenge is to discern which letter that blur most resembles? To my surprise, my eyesight had actually improved, which means that my glasses have been too strong for the last five years and consequently images have been beamed towards the back of my cranium instead of the retina.
I make a mental note to visit the opticians more often that once in a blue moon.

Saturday 25th February

Is this the gloomiest winter ever? Today offers some respite from the grey blanket that seems to have smothered both light and spirit from Southeast England. As usual, I take Lily to the swings in the afternoon where we practice some walking and invade a pirate's ship, manned by three five-year old monsters, piqued that Lily has suddendly materialized on the starboard bow. One of them seems to be shooting her with two Dirty Harry style magnums, one in each hand. I did not know that pirates were armed with such weapons? I cannot be bothered to protest and allow him to blow Lily away. She just smiles obliviously and gets on with her walking practice.

Sunday 26th February

Drive down to Southend under melancholy circumstances, since my nan is valiantly battling at the crease in her final over, facing a particularly belligerant Shane Warne in the form of a broken hip and advance stages of Alzheimers and Parkinsons, two of God's less inspired creations. I loathe hospitals, that antiseptic fug masking disease and decay, the threadbare hospital itself in dire need of a makeover. I park nearby to avoid the parking fee and deprive the NHS of a couple of quid, walk towards the entrance, which for some bizarre reason is decorated with a mosaic of a giant snake. Surely snakes are venomous? Why not a benevolent creature like a servile puppy or a duck-billed platypus?

I walk through the empty reception. The last time I was here was in the early 1990's when I caught mild pneumonia from my unheated flat (you never notice the cold when you are off your head most of the time.) It was busy then, thronging with patients looking to be mended, but today on God's day of rest, you have to wait until Monday to be patched up. A mass of people loiter impatiently outside the lift, two of them (lifts, not people) are on the blink and not wishing to spend eternity waiting for ascent, I opt for the stairs up to the 9th floor. By the time I reach the summit, I feel like asking the nurse to prepare a bed so that I can recover from exhaustion and altitude sickness.

I make a quick reckie around the ward, survey a few old women but she is not there, so I ask the matron which bed she is lying in. In fact I had been looking straight at her, but advanced terminal illness disfigures. Its always a shock to see someone you love lying withered and incoherent, but she is still my nan and all I can do is sit silent for 15-minutes reminiscing about times gone by.
Death: just a part of life.