von rings up at 11.30 and cries goodbye! goodbye! and i say, darling, i don't leave till july 1, not june 1. i have much packing and cleaning to do, and papers to finish up. so we spend an hour and a half talking about how he dislikes harriet walters as harriet and how edward petherbridge's voice is too high (me: rubbish! he's brilliant!) and caddy's wedding and von's teenage infatuations and one or two of my patrons and how he might meet an heiress (patrons, von, i say, you need patrons.) and which of us is dearer to julian (julian had better settle this before there is more bloodshed) and then he went off to boil some gangrenous potatoes for supper. (him: i'm going to boil some multicoloured potatoes. me: why? him: to eat lah, why else? me: idiot, why are they multicoloured! him: i will call you back in an hour. )

i was quite amused to find out today on radio that ross noble has been to singapore, which he complains is the clammiest place on earth, on account of the humidity, which he simply could not stop talking about. "i've been sticking to things all day!" (he also says you can tell an englishman in singapore because he is the one who's gently wobblying in the heat.) i keep trying to get people to come to visit over the summer, but judging from reactions to recent cambridge weather i shouldn't think anyone will be able to stand the humidity. if at 70% and mild sun they're all wailing, what will they do when they arrive in singapore and face the 95% humidity?

not as funny as some of his other journeys, but amusing enough, anyway.

on the japanese invasion: "the most ridiculous transport! i love the fact the japanese came in on bikes! that's hilarious isn't it! the british are standing around, "no don't worry everything will be fine, we have the whole of the sea covered, nobody's getting in there, we're the finest army in the world..."
"bring bring!"

mocking the merlion - "it's designed by a drunken bloke, could've been anything, couldn't it? might as well have been a hippo and an ewok."

i loved it when he made fun of singaporeans. he said, how many singaporeans are in here. then a pause. and he said, you can tell you're in singapore, because you all put your hands up! and then he demonstrated what normal people did and said, where are the australians in here? and a cheer went up.

was telling some english department folk over dinner that they should do what shari's parents did, which is to come to singapore, leave their suitcases chez minz, take a backpack and start travelling in the region - malaysia, thailand, indonesia, vietnam - and in between countries they would be spend a day or two in singapore and we'll go do something fun, and then they can go off to the next country, and i'll see them again in a week, and so on. there's even an asean pass now that lets you travel through three countries, i think.

von rings me back at 2.30 by which time i'd been asleep for a while and i wake up sufficiently to argue that lobotomy would improve his life, that he ought to read uplifting books like thud, and that he would be happier if he wrote more. he has gone to do this very thing.

i shall to bed.