Breakfast the Two-Hundred-and-Nintieth

Oaty, nutty smug healthy cereal from Real Foods.

Waking up to a still-warm hot water bottle is a pretty clear indication that you have not been asleep for long enough. Lately I've been yawning by on between five-and-a-half to six hours sleep most nights.

I've never been fantastic at going to bed at a sensible hour; it's often at 11 o'clock that I suddenly become efficient: writing letters, doing laundry, practising my cello (pizzicato so as not to enrage the neighbours).

It is not efficiency that's been keeping me up lately though. It is working for Satan. I think it's because going to sleep brings the next -- working -- day hurtling towards you. If you delay sleep, in a funny way, you delay work.

Tomorrow though is the day that I give Satan my notice. I'm rather looking forward to switching out the light tonight.