July 9 (Friday): I wake up still tired, emerging from a dream watching Millwall at the Den, onto lugging bands and their equipment around (Adam from Cats Against The Bombs for some reason) and ending with job hunting for high paid jobs. There is a email waiting from Toronto Phoebe with the subject "longest email EVER...not really but close" and shortly after reading it she hits me on MSN. We shoot the shit and this makes me slightly late for work, as I walk in listening to Moyles on a morning rather off form.

Work is a spin. Tompkins buys us cakes for his birthday last week (whatever, just give me cake). I look out the window of Chernobyl and see Azmei drive past the office. I wonder if she is on her way to Leicester at that precise time. Its kind of sad how things ended with us. Just imagine her position right now, packing up and heading to the Midlands to begin a new life, how many emotions must that be evoking. Everyone seems leave Colchester.

I finally get my expenses out of Jimmy, who is in a very good mood which is really pleasant. I think he took pity when I told him "I am sailing close to the wind" and that I was meeting a beautiful lady in London tomorrow. We lunch in The Castle, we being me, Stevo and Louise (again) but not before I bank my cheque and buy Phoebe a birthday card. Me and Lulu could have lived without the lunching, especially when it makes us late back for the afternoon.

In the PM, Iran comes over with Acme Transport and makes comment to me that I have used to wrong ETB on the job. We have a really heated argument, or rather I get quite heated. At the firm Ivan is one of the good guys, not to be argued with but there I go, shouting him down. He points out every other word I am saying is fucking and I slow down and sort myself, imagine if I was arguing like this with a partner. Whoops. The afternoon gets worse when Andrex comes over with the budgets for the year so far, the first six months worth and I am six grand the wrong way on my budget, by far the worst staff member at my/our level, only beaten by Kranky for on paper incompetence. An even worse statistic is that Lulu has physically billed more work than I this year. On paper, I am a terrible accountant. Other than that though it's another sweltering afternoon in Chernobyl and at the end of the day Stevo gives me a lift home after a lot of the end of the day is spent fucking around getting a map together for Stapleford for Monday so I can get to the client we are doing an audit on (Acmega). The one time I need to off and out the door on time in order to get somewhere (home) I am held up. Needless to say we don't go to see Fahrenheit 9/11, it has not come to Colchester. I take it that it just isn't big enough a film to make happy Colchester but I later get it pointed out to me that being a soldier town, such a film showing here would cause something of a rumpus to say the least. When Stevo drops me off it is the most beautiful summer's evening and I really feel I should be making more of life, I note:

"PM Friday. I finally get in and I am experiencing some kind of epiphany. The only night I had to be somewhere fast and I'm dragging. Millions of thoughts are literally racing through my head. I listen to the same song over and over, 5 times in a row (Leaving California by Shawn Smith). I’m having one of those “what am I doing moments?�. The week is over and all seems to have gone quiet and it is really unnerving to me. Obviously my budget apparent seachange changes everything. I really should have and should be going out tonight; very few evenings are as beautiful as this"

I text Azmei to tell her I saw her and ask her how things are going and to wish her luck with her move.

Finally, I manage to get home to see the olds and help them out on their computer and online loan application. The loans they are going for are horrific, the interest rates make my skin curl and the collateral is my parents home, all this for a new Ford Fiesta.

I can see why dad is having problems with the computer, it is full of filth. I attempt to rectify to situation and some kind of adware attaches itself to the desktop and I can't get rid of it. I phone Tom for tips on software to download to sort this and he recommends Adaware but can't speak because he is on his way in to see Fahrenheit 9/11 on the day of its release. So now, instead of just helping my parents fill out their online loan application I have managed to get myself involved in a major mission of cleaning up their computer, scanning for virus with Panda and wiping shit off with Adware. And all the time I have the olds like parrots asking me what I'm doing and how is the loan application going. A normally calm person, tonight I am short of patience.

Azmei texts me and says she thought that I had forgotten about her, adding “keep in touch. Please�. I look out of the window, into the bright Holland-on-Sea summer evening and it makes me feel young again but also prompts me to pine for similar times which I now feel I wasted, nostalgia makes you old.

Eventually we get onto the loan application by which time it is getting late and the olds have lost as much interest as I never actually had in it in the first place. We go through the motions and it is actually pretty easy to fill out in the end, providing the information is at hand. All in all, it barely takes ten minutes.

By this point, Becki has been evicted from the Big Brother house and I watch her post-eviction interview. She still looks like a plant to me. After that is Bo Selecta and this show gets better and better, I wet myself laughing out loud at the Jack Osbourne and the Bear is on This Morning with Philip and Fern and when they cut to a caller, Stephen from Hampstead Heath, I realise I will never be that funny.

I drive home late and pretty much fall asleep as soon as I get home, nothing doing tonight in this world.

np: Shawn Smith - Leaving California