h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Click up it's just past six. Click I'm dressed and having breakfast. Click I'm in the car and leaving long Compton up Old Hill heading towards the Rollright stones. Click I've got an impatient driver up my arse, he tries to overtake once and nearly hits an oncoming car. Click he has another go and again nearly hits an oncoming car. Click I'm doing 70 where I'd usually do 60, doing, 80 where I'd usually do 70. Click I'm on the run down off the Cotswolds at Birdlip. Click I shiver to a halt in traffic trying to get onto the M32 in Bristol. Click, click, clicketty click. I open the garage doors at work. It's 7.45 and I'm at my desk. Now what?

Diarlyand beckons. It's going to take a long, long time to enter 8,000 or so entries from old diaries. I chose to begin in and around autumn 1984. Things had gone wrong in my 8 year plan to get into the BBC earlier that year, I'd been wooed by various advertising agencies, accepted a position at JWT and hated it. I called us reps the Oxbridge Prostates. Bright brains to do the bidding of dim clients. Worse, I was bored. There was not formal induction. Instead I was put at a desk and got things to do at the whim of my immediate boss and she is more often than not too busy on other accounts. Meanwhile my girlfriend is in France for the year and I have the use of a flat in the Whitehall Court. I spend most days and nearly every evening in the company of woman. Bringing Lucinda Gibson back to the flat to pose naked for me has left an enduring impression on my diary landscape. Much else was going on besides, my growing realisation that I didn't have a girlfriend as Vicki and i would split up, her 21st coming up on 22nd November and various close and arm's lengths liaisons.
I took an hour out to check through some of these entries from the 1980s in simple text so that they could be pasted into the HTML Template of Diaryland. I'm taking entries back to the present tense and leaving them as written. Editorially changes are made simply to improve understanding. Whist I have elaborated on some of the key events over the years reading them back it is clear that there is much more truth and logic in the original entries. What happens otherwise is I end up losing what limited sense of narrative exists by giving notes, not only on who these people are, the place and circumstances, but also giving notes on what later happens. In this muddle I can see that the feelings and priorities of the boy, the teenager, the young man at the time, are being lost.

Questions on a promotional video I've been asked to put together for BBS Media Relations are not being answered; I suspect the task is little more than a time filler. I want projects to manage, to write and direct. I can't see from where these are going to materialise.

Turning back to the Website Best Practice article I've written I took the chance to visit a number of sites and give them a full review. With several new sites being suggested to me each day this can become a lengthy task. Chris Powles thanked me for the 47 page attachment on the subject.

Lesley is time filling too now that the Lloyds TSB audio-cassettes job is out of the way. She spent ages trying to download an MP3 file from a music site and failed. This spoilt her impression of the Internet and the WWW. From this I can see that those being introduced to websites need to be guided to sites that are simple to use, they should ideally indulge the new user's personal interests as well - give them something which will absorb them. What we want is them coming away converts to the medium!

Come 1.30 I'd decided to take the rest of the afternoon off, I had a house to look at in Portskellen anyway.

Racing up the M4 towards Chepstow I managed to slip into the wrong lane and had to double back having got onto the M5 South.

A back road took me off the main Chepstow to Caldicot road into Portskellen. It left me underwhelmed. A smattering of properties of muddled provenance, mostly of lower value. Manor Cottage I found disturbingly close to the roads to Caldicot and the most used road to Chepstow. Though full of character, mostly 17th century with great thick walls and a huge fireplace I was put off by public access up the side of the house, the roads and the news that the fields behind this collection of 3 houses had been bought by Monmouthshire CC to turn into a Junior School and Playing Fields.

Then on to St. Brievels. Not far but a twisting road north of Chepstow where I got stuck behind a van. St. Brievels is no less inspiring than Long Compton. It has a castle, it has a couple of pubs and a couple of shops (of sorts). Crossways is on the edge of the old village with the main road running down one side. Across the road there are local authority properties, some bought and done up. Across the village road in front of the house there is a large playing field and children's recreation ground.

The house. No garden to speak of - turned to gravel with a large raised bed at one end. Gates onto the gravel and parking for 4 cars. Garage, patio in front of kitchen windows and back door.

A large, inviting, well-fitted out kitchen/dining room. All tiled and well maintained. Proud owner has given a lot of thought to the place. Good space to work in with a dining room table one step down from the kitchen area. Off to one side room for a desk with fitted shelves. Round the corner to a cloakroom and shower. Also direct access to the garage where the washing machine is plumbed in.

Through into the hall and on either side of the stairs a living room and snug. Both with feature fire-places and working sash windows. One with a wood burning stove and fitted shelves to the back wall.

Upstairs and on the landing or mezzanine a bathroom with washbasin and wc. Nicely fitted. Also a snug single bedroom under the eaves and looking onto the back of the house. Onto the top landing and three further rooms. Two reasonable size double beds and in between a study, or baby's room with a phone point, desk and computer currently in place.

Loft recently treated. Kept clear to preserve the condition of the wood (I was told).

No more isolated than Long Compton, though 22 miles to Gloucester, so some 58 miles from Barton on the Heath. Only 7.5 miles to Chepstow, superstore, delicatessen and swimming pool. Close to the Wye Valley and all the attractions of the Forest of Dean.

How would we manage as a family? Ample space to grow up in, then when they head for secondary school we move into town ? A long, long, long way off!

Home via Tescos in Stowe. Spoke to Zoe from the payphone. Bought oysters, muscles and wine. Knocked back a handy double gin and tonic. 4 out of the 6 oysters were heavenly. Last tried one in France in 1977 and was too disgusted to like them. Cooked up Moules Marinieres for Wanda. Drank half the wine and made up the rest of the liquid with home brewed chicken stock. Gorgeous.

Ran off a dream from February 1993 and shared in with Wanda. Called "Sisters on Ice" it expresses very well my feelings about my special relationship with her. My analysis of that dream is remarkably appropriate for all the decisions we are currently making.