Good Friday in London

A walk from one side of Hyde Park to the other in order to see my parents and cousins for dinner, just as the sun began to set. I got caught up in a Critical Mass rollerblading event and was briefly surrounded by a huge clump of rollerbladers all dancing, slipping, lurching and gliding along to a thumping Euro-disco tune broadcast by a guy on a bike

Two competitive cousins trying to outdo each other in hugging me goodbye (one year old Aaron wins because he was intent and serious and didn't seem to enjoy it at all but was determined to cling on longer than his sister)

The top deck of a bus that reeked of spilled beer and fried chicken, which I've come to realise is standard on all London Transport buses after 10.30pm

The top end of Edgware Road just beginning to look busy as the affluent Arabic community began to gather for a typical "warm-weather" Friday night

A group of quite good-looking young men playing cricket with a bag of oranges, some traffic cones and proper cricket bats at about 11.30pm on my street corner

A pair of tramps lying back to back outside Oddbins off-licence, shouting and singing at each other

There were two, perhaps three occasions when I almost trod in vomit. It will clearly require a few more sunny bank holidays before the public learn to hold their wine once they've sat in a pub garden all day

Five Things You May Not Know About Me

1. I have had minor cosmetic surgery on Harley Street.

It was expensive. I've never regretted it.

2. I never, ever, ever blowdry my hair.

Not even at a hairsalon. I would rather walk out with wet, freshly cut, unstyled hair than have my head super-heated with warm air. My hair is very, very, very black (almost blue-black), and also very, very, very thick and heavy, dead straight and absorbs heat to such an extreme, there is always the risk I will pass out in the hairsalon chair if my hairdresser attempts the arm-breaking task of blowdrying the black mass on my head. So, no blowdry. Ever.

3. I have never climbed a tree.

I've vaguely swung on a low branch but have never had both feet off the ground or been higher than two or three feet up the trunk of a tree.

4. I smoked for 8 years.

From the second I turned 16 up to midnight 31 December 2004, I smoked Marlboro Lights, maximum 15 a day. I had a brief period of smoking American clove cigarettes with sugared filters. Towards the end of my tobacco tenure, I rolled my own cigarettes and was smoking only two or three tiny daily roll-ups for a while. My husband then quit very successfully with the Alan Carr method and I felt confident I'd quit and stay smoke-free too, so for the last month or so before my date to finally stop, I smoked all sorts of things in one last smoky romantic fling: menthol cigarettes, roll-ups made with liquorice paper, with menthol flavoured filters, different brands of rolling tobacco, different brands of cigarettes, cigars, shisha pipes... then I stopped. I have not smoked for over two years.

5. I don't wear a wedding ring.

We didn't manage to organise wedding rings in time for our ceremony and still haven't managed it. I wear my engagement ring. My husband has an unadorned hand.

That's all for now. More to come if I think of anything else.