Well, it's almost a year since I began to write my diary and I wanted to spend this entry reflecting on everything that's happened in that time.

It seemed a conceited notion that anybody would want to read about the boring, humdrum minutiae of my life, but it seems that many of you do. I get lots of mail about the diary - most of it telling me that I'm a lazy slacker and I should be writing more, but it's just not that easy to do. I have to feel compelled to write my diary. I have to be in the right mood, in the zone, in the groove, cooking on gas. I am all of those things practically all of the time, but not necessarily in a writing way.

I could write at any time, but unless I'm feeling it, I know it'll just be empty words and won't be amusing or thought provoking. I like my diary to be both; sometimes the pieces are flippant, and sometimes they're heavier than school sponge pudding, but I hope they are always enjoyable to read.

I had to leave my desk to get essential supplies from Tesco, and I got writing withdrawal symptoms as I was driving home. It's always a good sign because it means I'm eager to get back to my desk and unleash my muse. My head starts to conjure up imagery and little phrases come into my mind that are invariably the beginnings of a new piece of writing. But I can't start now, as I have to unpack my shopping and get some lunch. I bet J.K. Rowling doesn't have to unpack her own shopping when she's hot to type..

I've unpacked, eaten soup, and read Heat. Now, where was I?

My very first entry was about my thumb hammer horror. In the last year I have managed to build quite a lot of things using wood and nails, which in my case invariably involves some kind of digital injury and rather a lot of blood. But since the finger bashing incident I have learned to take more care of my digits and have managed to do a good deal of woodwork around the house without losing any more blood or cutting off any important body parts.

I know I shocked a lot of people when I wrote that I once smoked a pipe. Some female fans from Holloway Prison even clubbed together and sent me a tweed smoking jacket and some tickets to a KD Lang concert, so I think they may have got slightly the wrong idea about me. But by far the kindest gift was an ounce of cherry pipe tobacco that my friend Jane sent me as a reward for appearing on the show she produces for BBC Radio Shropshire. The tobacco came from the very same shop that I'd visited years before; the tin is sitting before me now, and every so often I'll lift off the lid and take a good, long hit. (I must add that although Jane is a kind and thoughtful friend, she's not that good a friend, as she insisted on keeping the sour cherry drops that originally came in the tin, and then delighted in telling me how delicious they were. Sadly she didn't choke on any of them.)

I like cyclists, but now they don't much care for me. After reading out my entry about riding a bicycle on a Sunday on R4 Home Truths I managed to stir up a whole shed load of angry cyclists, one of whom kindly sent me a link to an online cycling forum, so that I might fully appreciate just how much I'd offended them. I got a full two pages of pedal-pushing ire, but one of their company was obviously a fan of mine and he resolutely fought my corner. I'd like to thank him, but don't know his real name, as all the cyclists in the forum used natty pseudonyms like, innertubeman, saddlesore and Ireallyloveshavingmylegsandtheycan'ttouchmeforit.

I have to come clean and admit that I went out on my bike the day after the broadcast. It was a lovely spring morning and as I don't have the excuse of Sunday morning sex to tempt me away from the saddle, I thought it would be a good way to get some fresh air and a bit of exercise. I suppose I quite enjoyed it, but I was constantly looking behind me, half expecting to be chased by some yellow-shirted smooth-legged saddleslut and then beaten to the ground with his miniature bicycle pump. (A friend of mine uses the word cyclist as a pseudonym for wanker, when she's in the staffroom at her school, but I couldn't possibly comment..)

This year has been especially notable for the number of diary readers that have now become firm friends. Jane, my sweet-snaffling 'baccy pimp is now someone I write to almost every day (so you can blame her for the lack of entries. ) Then there's Jonathan, a widower who regularly writes to me to let me know what he thinks of the diary. I like the fact that he uses excellent grammar in his correspondence. I have to curb my usual crude prose and adopt a similar style to his when I write back, and even now he's under the mistaken impression that I'm as linguistically demure as Barbara Cartland. (Sorry to disappoint you Johnny, but you had to find out sometime.)

I finally met my friend Sarah last weekend She's been writing to me since the site began and it was so wonderful to meet her in person after two years of e-mailing. She looked nothing like her photograph in Bella magazine, but then neither did I. 'Glum and Glummer' would have been a fitting description of the two of us, and we both agreed that as an article about our desire to meet a new man, it did a pretty fantastic job of ensuring that we would never, ever meet anybody who wasn't either partially-sighted, masochistic, or both.

That aside, we had an excellent evening. We got very slightly drunk and then Sarah tried to teach me some Spanish. I thought my stunning grasp of German was impressive - the words, windowsill, biro, bus stop and table, constitute my entire German vocabulary, but Sarah has a Spanish phrase for every occasion, which is: 'I'm not feeling very well because I've been hit on the back of the head with a pistol butt.' You might think I'm joking, but it's quite true. (No me estoy sintiendo muy bien porque me han golpeado en la parte posteriora de la cabeza con un extremo de la pistola.) Try it out next time you go to the Balearics and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

So I've made friends through my diary and I've made a few enemies, but I think if people get offended, then they have every right to turn off their computers. Writing an online journal is all about personal opinion and personal experience and reading it is all about personal choice. I don't expect everyone to like it, but I'm glad that most people seem to get a kick out of reading it. The last year has been fantastic for me. I've loved writing my diary and I promise I'll keep it up, at least until I become an obscenely rich writer, and earn enough money to pay J.K. to write it for me.


© Kate Boydell 2004. All rights reserved. e-mail: [email protected]. Close window.