Scrapbook: Week 7

February 14-20, 2026

SATURDAY 14 I’ve discovered that our cheap litter-picker is very good at picking virtually anything from the floor, which of course is a fabulous discovery once you get to an age when bending down is hazardous and painful.

📌 England had a torrid time against Scotland in the Six Nations rugby, but I couldn’t help once again noticing how obedient the players are to the referee. In the past, snobs would have claimed that this “politeness” was down to class, but I’m not sure that argument ever held water. So it’s a mystery I will continue to mull over. Maybe one day a definitive answer will arrive. I will report back when that happens.

📌 By some weird interpersonal form of submission, I watched The Masked Singer on TV, in which Toastie, who I had presumed to be Tom Daley was revealed to be Ben Shephard.

SUNDAY 15 The New Statesman has a fantastic assessment of the current Arsenal football team that just happens to be a restaurant review as well.

📌 This hasn’t happened for a while…

📌 To the O2 Millennium Dome with Marge for the Strictly Come Dancing Live Tour and a sometimes quite harrowing experience of the Venue Village concept in action. Lots of low-paid jobs here in North Greenwich inside a sinister playground of shops, restaurants, bars and an arena that hosts big-production entertainment events. It was fun-ish. It was (thankfully) free. It was tormenting in so many ways, but above all it was BIG. I won’t be hurrying back (two medium glasses of wine and a small can of beer cost £37). La Voix fell over and Craig scored her 1. Lewis & Katya won. Jimmy was our favourite. The “Ginger Tosser” lurked among the show dancers. The big revelation was that Craig is the director of these big annual roadshows.

MONDAY 16 I must get on the case and start reading Waiting For Godot, since my wife’s cousin is appearing in a current stage production and we intend to visit Liverpool next month to see it.

TUESDAY 17 I met Michelle and Sean at Acrylicize. We checked out the exhibition space and gave their staff a pep-talk about how to make a big appliqué banner of self-portraits.

📌 A very successful logo workshop with Emily triggered a lot of discussion (including the theory that the Amazon “smile” logo is a circumcised penis) and a few more ideas. We need to establish how important London is to the logo identity, and that will require a meeting with senior management.

📌 To Barbican Cinema 3 for one of the best black comedies I’ve seen in years. The Korean film No Other Choice is right up there with the Coen Brothers for wickedly entangling murder and morality in a way that makes evil seem OK if those doing it make you laugh out loud.

WEDNESDAY 18 Mr Konan, the orthopedic surgeon I saw at UCLH today says I need both hips replacing and the first one (left) will be done within 3 months. It was the outcome I wanted, but it will mean planning carefully as soon as we have a date.

THURSDAY 19 Larry Elliot reckons Labour can win the next election. He says the nation’s social and economic fortunes are on the turn. The only thing that can stop Labour winning is if Keir Starmer is still in charge.

📌 Chris was as stroppy as ever at the Headway Coproduction meeting, but he made some good points about a power-sharing continuum. He’s good on questions but short on answers, strong on the WHAT but weak on the HOW. People who don’t know him back off, but I know him and don’t.

FRIDAY 20 Andrew Mountbatten Windsor looks even more sinister in black and white than he does in colour.

📌 Michelle sent a picture of me and Cecil in the studio.

It was taken one day when I agreed to be a model for a life-drawing session. Cecil is pictured showing me his finished drawing…

📌 I searched the bedroom floor in vain for the missing sock. Then I realised I’d put two socks on the same foot.

📌 Devyani is to leave the Barbican. Her resignation coincides with the appointment of a very fierce-looking new CEO called Abigail and speculation once again about the Barbican’s commitment to diversity in the arts.

📌 We got plenty of good feedback from the management team when we presented the roughs for the new Headway logo and I think Emily has settled on a certain image to take forward and perfect.

📌 Michelle kidnapped me from the logo workshop I was meant to be doing with Emily to observe Jon Barry painting another glamorous portrait. Jon’s finished paintings always look serene and effortless, but behind them all is a colossal struggle.

Read all of my scrapbook diaries…

PLEASE MESSAGE WITH ANY CORRECTIONS, BIG OR SMALL.

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