In which it all goes a bit wrong for the Turtles.

Thursday 25th October

It was all going so well. Everything was under control. The week was panning out wonderfully. But oh no, it can never just be easy, can it?

For a start, I've got a Ford Focus for the rest of the week. It does the job, I suppose but after driving the Seat, the Ford feels like a cheap plastic crate. Next up, I set off to Rainbow early (I've got to pick the costumes up again, remember) so that I can have a bacon sarn from the bacon sarn van on the way, and I run into Fiona fuming in Starbucks because she'd set off at five this morning, thinking it was a 7am call, when in fact it was a 9. I've worked with Fi quite a bit this year, and she's great, but like all good Yorkshirewomen she can throw herself into a bad mood with tremendous vigour.

The we get to Rainbow and I'm informed of the latest development. Kevin, one of the roadies who took over yesterday should have been with us for the next two days, but it turns out he can only fo today, so they've had to find a replacement. aid replacement is a person of with whom I have it recorded on file that I am not prepared to work ever again. A person so inconsiderate and unprofessional that even my normally phlegmatic demeanour has been stirred up into righteous anger on more than one occasion. Alan in the office apologises. There was no alternative. He's given her a call to rendezvous with us at 4.30, in the hope that she'll get there for 6.00.

So off I go to Lakeside retail park in Thurrock, a swift jaunt around the m25, to meet up with The other three Turtles, Kevin and The Lovely Emily at another big soulless ASDA. Along come the face painter and a new lot of local martial arts childs, and we go through the usual routine. The we pack up and go down to Bluewater for afternoon appearances at another branch of the familiar well-known music retailer, where once again the Turtles pick their way through mountains of stock piled around the floor like a game of premier league kerplunk. Bluewater is busy, and unfortunately rowdy, and one Turtle gets belted on the head and is invalided out for the rest of the day.

By 6pm, we're all done and unsurprisingly there's no sign of our relief roadie. To make matters worse, there's been a horrendous accident on the M25 involving an oil tanker, right around the very junction next to Bluewater. Now, we need to get on the road up to Leeds for tomorrow's gig - it's a fair old run and the girls are tired and fed up. So heads are scratched and phone calls are made and The Lovely Emily abandons us to our fate and gets on the train because her company will pay for things like that. Eventually we come up with a plan in which Fi will take Kevin's hire car and drive the girls up to the hotel, I'll take kevin home to Watford then head on up to Leeds, where I'm staying at Mum and Dad's, and our tardy colleague can follow us at her leisure. Or she can go stick her head in a pig, as far as we're concerned at this precise moment. All this being cleared and re-cleared with the office, this is what we do, so instead of spending the evening in a leisurely drive up the M1 with The Lovely Emily, lots of music and a stop for food on expenses on the way, I end up queueing round the M25 (which is still backed up for miles) to Watford, then driving up to Leeds on my own. In the dark. In a Ford Focus.

I eventually got to Mum and Dad's at about 1am. They, of course, are not at home. They're in France. So the house is absolutely bloody Baltic and I'm forced to go to bed in an old tracksuit of Dad's to keep my circulation going through the night. Brrr.