Ah me - another glum day. Actually, it started well, with sunshine and all that, but I blew out a trip through just having a wave of glum pass over me. I don't call it depression, because I don't think it is that. What I have always suffered from is not angst, either - or frustration or envy - let's see - what else isn't it?

Anyway, cut to the chase - I think what I get is despair. I despair of humans (don't watch the news), I despair of myself. Glum, like I said. I can't think of a better word. Sounds like a good old Saxon word to go with the day that turns grey and rains.
And I don't suppose it helps to contemplate the past too much - maybe it just makes me feel old. And perhaps it doesn't help that I have been spending intermittent days without drinking or smoking - I don't have hangovers much anyway, but I guess withdrawal is worse (otherwise why would we get addicted to habits?) Or am I just dog-tired?

Did I put you off yet? I could write this stuff in a closed file, quite happily, and keep up the appearances, but a diary is a diary. Still, Mali did describe this as a 'column' which I hadn't thought of it as. I rather like that. A journalist with a readership of a dozen people. Actually, it is to keep up my typing skills, and to write routinely to keep the flow going, and to leave a little trail for my son [and my daughter, Yolande Jodi Philpott - if she ever seeks me out - Hi Yo!] or my sister, or my friends abroad to catch up (I hate phones) - but mostly it is notes to myself (because I can write to it from home or from work, or when travelling...and I end up with a journal of my year).

When trying to remember the past (when writing for the website) I always regret the loss of so many photos, diaries and papers over the years. The stuff I have managed to hang onto is a small personal treasure trove (although visitors seem to think my room looks like a hamster cage of paper...I guess I identify with small, timid, seed-eating rodents, so that's fine). On a bad day like this I feel like I am running in a treadmill in a futile way...I might as well join a gym and run on the spot at great expense (with video of road going by) for all the adventure I feel I am getting right now.

Glum. A word to savour. I prefer the times when I feel glee. Indeed Saxon entertainers were called gleemen, which is one of the great lost words.