Wednesday 30 August 6:30am

I couldn’t sleep because mum has been snoring all night, and even though I have thick wallpaper her snores echoed and re-echoed enough to wake the departed. She got home late and she brought Mrs Ramsbotham and a bottle of sherry now lying empty upon the kitchen table (the bottle, that is, not Mrs Ramsbotham, who staggered home at 1:30 am, waking the entire street with her untuneful rendition of Amazing Grace.)

Although Mrs Ramsbotham is almost certainly not a pawnbroker by trade, I am beginning to feel a certain sympathy for Raskolnikov.

Also there is no food in the fridge again, and I am starving. I have found an old fruit gum in the pocket of my mac, and though it is a little furry I am sure it will wash off.

I do not feel like reading. I am behind with my piano practice, so I will attack the Raindrop Prelude again.