Bargain. Single Apex ticket from Clapham Junction to Swansea on Christmas Eve: £10.50. A four and a quarter hour journey via Chippenham, granted, but for £10.50? I suggest everyone takes advantage of this fantastic offer, purely because you can. I'm sure my grandmother won't mind the extra Yuletide company.

And a big yah-boo to First Great Western, whose best offer for my ignoble bum on their uncomfortable standard class seat chuffing out of Paddington was a pathetic 58 quid.

Being slightly cold-ridden, I'm chain slurping my way through sachets of the great British panacea: Lemsip. Although, looking at the ingredient list, it seems that any good that might be done by the Paracetamol and, err, sucrose, will be immediately vanquished by the presence of aspartame. A Frenchman called Eric recently advised me to stop drinking Diet Coke and to stick to the full fat stuff because of the well documented evils of aspartame. Personally I have the naive view that if something is in the shops, well, it must be safe. I mean, millions of people drink it, so at least if I do succumb to an artificially-sweetened thyroid disorder, at least I'll be taking a load of flabby weight-watchers with me. Just for the taste of it? Pah.

I'm concerned about the amount of time my flatmate is spending in Glasgow. For crying out loud, who will hoover? Who will wash the dishes? Who will glaze my torso with the finest honey, take pictures, and post them on hard-to-find internet bulletin boards?

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