It’s one o’clock in the morning and I’m sitting out on the decking with a nice little glass of wine. It’s completely still. No breeze, no traffic, no inner-city noise at all. Of course, the odd seagull is still at it. The worst is over on the seagull front, though, since Liam, my next-door neighbour, took this year’s abandoned fledgling to a rescue centre. It had found asylum in my driveway underneath the branches of the Chilean (or is it Argentinian ? – I can never remember) potato plant. I tried hard to give it water, and even opened a pack of smoked salmon for it. But it was too frightened and kept running away. Do seagulls like smoked salmon anyway ?? I’m glad it’s in safe hands. The noise the young ones make is horribly pathetic, and, what’s more, really piercing – and I can leave the house now without being mobbed by its parent. Anyway, the point of the story is that I have seen through midnight, the time at which I go from being on holiday, to being unemployed. It’s a lovely night. I’m comfortably warm in my shorts and T-shirt. The future is ahead of me and it’s going to be good.