Well. The wheels have come off. Off of the floor tool for the Dyson that is. It’s a bit of a bummer as a new floor tool will cost about £40. Such is life. Just when things are going well the wheels come off your floor tool.

However, on the upside, the alien that has been festering in my body for eight days has finally been removed. I had a splinter stuck down my little finger nail and I was starting to think it would be with me for life. If it had been there much longer I would have been obliged to give it a name. Sammy the Splinter perhaps or Bert the Bastard Bit of Basket that held Bread. The latter has a lovely poetic feel to it but alas is now no longer required.

At a party I was at yesterday we had to wrap a member of our team in toilet roll to look like an Egyptian Mummy. As you do. It took me back to my childhood – my mother wrapped me in toilet roll while she was on a training course for social workers. I have photos of me top-to-toe in toilet tissue at a tender age. I sometimes wonder how I turned out as ‘normal’ as I did. At the party last night I managed to get myself into a team where half the people were called John, or a John variant. The long night of the Johns.

January seems to go on forever. You get Twelfth Night out of the way - and the decs all back in their boxes - and it just stretches out in front of you with no chance of sighting pay day for yonks. I could really do with two pay days in January.