It's not been this hot since the summer of the Iraq war. Then - three years ago - the summer broke out early, gloriously, as they say here (I grimace), shining down while we watched and followed, with fear, concern and sometimes hope. It was the spring of Vauxhall Grove, and I had found my first room, after four years as a living couple: that room was tentative, and only temporary (is it ever different), and very little in it was mine, except my dream-notebook under the pillow. I watched long evenings burning ships dance on the wall, the shadows of candle-lit-existance. Then we gave up current affairs, and cycled on, cycled through, to arrive a month later tanned and troubled to a year in the East End. Summer 2003 was all Pink Jesus.

This summer is even hotter, I conclude, walking up Walworth Road with a Namibian beer bottle (it's weak, and nice, and I think of Michael), dusk descending on the Elephant beyond. I've gone to two cold showers a day; escaping to have ginger beer in the Ritzy; but mainly hiding in the BL. Right now, in 'Asian and African Collections' (the renamed 'Oriental and India Office'; Political correctness, or perhaps Imperial amnesia). Persian kings - Nadir Shah espcially - are looking over my shoulders, their portraits huge and meancing. It sounds like the fire alarm now. I think escape is advisable.