Wet patch and the draft board

The coffee thing is in. I can't kill it. It's already a bit for Tuesday and I haven't even written it — mum handed me the tissue and said "same as when you were nine, love, every time" and that's a punchline she wrote for me, the cow. I am furious at how good her timing is. I am furious that I am her son and it shows.

The niece said "Uncle Ollie wet" and I wanted to die and then I wanted to put it in a set and that's the whole disease, isn't it. Watch a man humiliate himself and immediately pitch it. I should be embarrassed. I am. I'm also already workshopping the staging.

Yara. I wrote "mum. tomorrow?" like a man with a prior appointment she has to respect. She sent a skull. She knows I've been with mum and she knows it means I'm cooked by Sunday night and she knows the skull means "I accept your terms, you disaster." I am not going to mess this up. New version. Clean version. I keep thinking about the version like it's a flat I haven't moved into yet. Don't scuff the floor.

Banshee tonight. Seven minutes. The room was — I don't know what the room was. I blacked out half of it. A bit about my dad and a Tesco meal deal landed. A bit about an estate agent didn't. The middle, I just talked and nothing happened and the room breathed at me. Two comics at the bar said "yeah, that was alright" in the voice comics use when it wasn't. One of them was on a bill last year with someone who shouldn't have been. I keep a list in my head of who was on what and what they got and I cannot stop. I am keeping a list that does me no good.

Walked home through the Old Town. Texted Yara goodnight. She sent a heart. I have now received one skull and one heart in the same day from the same woman and I am a richer man than I was at half nine.

Brochure in bed. Festival. I read the names and I do the math. Who is on what. Who is up. I don't read it like a punter. I read it like a scout reads a draft board. Sick thing.

Mum — I still haven't told her the thing. She was here all day and laughed at the coffee and I almost said it at the bookshop and I didn't. I'll ring her Tuesday. After the jeans. After the preview. After I'm not a thing that needs her to be careful with.

Still ranking rooms. Still flinching. Still going.