Before the radio programme last night, Tim and I sat in the Tai buffet place on Greek St, watching Slipknot fans filing past towards the Astoria. Or maybe they were all going to the swanky Gay Hussar restaurant, but on reflection it was probably to the Astoria, as Slipknot were playing there. Seeing this fantastic procession of glum looking kids in their best Camden Market garb, it made me wish that carnivals were more like this; floats with goths sitting on the sides, feet dangling over the edge, popping black balloons with long needles while Bauhaus and Play Dead blast out of the loudspeakers. Or perhaps a steel band comprising 12 Nick Cave lookalikes who refuse to hit more than one note every six seconds or so, like the tolling of a distant church bell. Tim, who is a sprightly gent in his early 40s, said “Goodness me, it looks like the audition for the Addams Family,” as if he'd never been exposed to disaffected youth before. “Ah, you must have gone through a sickeningly miserable period in your teens where you wore black all the time?” I asked him. “Yeah, but I wore light blue.”

Two men walked in to Tai, attracted by the colourful display of food in the window. They sat down, were given their plates and proceeded to help themselves to the buffet. After about 3 minutes we heard a commotion. “Excuse me… Oi! this beef is awful. Tastes really weird, and it's really soggy.” The waitress explained. “Sir, this is all vegan. No meat. It's a vegan buffet.” The two blokes were outraged, as if they'd been duped in an audacious pyramid-selling get-rich-quick scheme. “VEGAN??” exploded the larger of the two. “VEGAN??? You never said it was vegan! Well we're not paying for this.” He looked at his mate. “It's vegan! Did you hear that? Vegan!” The other guy shook his head. They walked out leaving their plates largely untouched, and stood outside for about 5 minutes, just staring at the front of the restaurant in disbelief, not realising that all the items in the buffet actually fell well within the Venn Diagram of their regular diet.

I just missed a call on my mobile from an 07090 number (because my phone's vibrate setting appears to have been knackered by being dropped on the floor too many times.) I've never had a call from one of these before – they appear to be the new set of numbers that can be diverted to any mobile or landline, perfect for the person who has a dozen mobile phones and chooses one of them in the morning like normal people might choose a pair of socks. Anyway, I tried ringing it back a few times and just received a series of computer generated female voices, telling me that “we are trying to locate the person you require”. But no-one never located nobody, nohow. Useless service. And this rather short cat and mouse game probably cost me about £5 in call charges, too. Tut tut.