Half an hour ago or so I suddenly experienced a truly awful pain down the outside of my left shin and thought I was in for some horrible medical condition that would require hospitalisation at least. Then, on getting to my feet, a wasp fell to the floor and I gave it a thorough trampling so now being unrecognisable I can only presume it was a wasp before being trampled on. Obviously it had somehow got caught in my sock. Ceri and I looked on the internet to find out how to treat wasp stings, this is after Douglas had splattered me, my sock, and the kitchen floor with balsamic vinegar. I asked for vinegar but I don’t think the balsamic kind did any good. Anyway, this is what it said on Google: first wash with soap and water, secondly cool I with ice, thirdly apply an antibiotic cream, fourthly take an anti-histamine. So okay okay, I’ve done all that and the bugger’s still hurting like crazy. Hopefully it will ease off. If not I’ll just have to try a different cream.

Douglas is slaving away preparing for tonight’s party. David, Penny, Chris and Dennis have gone off for the day, I was supposed to be Douglas’s assistant but he seems to be keeping me well out of the way, and Ceri is upstairs reading Just In Case (sequel to Dead On Time ). She didn’t go out with the others because she washed her hair and said it wasn’t ready to be seen in public!

David has also been conned into reading Just In Case, in his case hoping that (apart form enjoying it of course) he might spot any errors we have missed. It’s quite amazing how many time one can go through a manuscript, even slowly and deliberately, and still miss the odd mistake, like he discovered I had spelt bath as both – how do you take a hot both? Or even a cold one for that matter. I’m a bit more tolerant now of mistakes I find in published books though really, by the time they go to press, they should be free of error. Charmaine has gone off on holiday reading the second half of No Official Umbrella and Hillary is reading Angel. What an editorial team, Angel has just had its first rejection (of how many I wonder before someone realises they’ve got a Booker Prize novel here?) though I am told I am a compelling writer and this bloody sting is not only till stinging, it’s throbbing to boot.