Woke up this morning from an unfortunate dream about engaging positively with the Big Society, as represented by a young man in a consultation meeting who kept volunteering his Dad to do complicated database/web-integration work, insisting that all the tasks in question were really easy and could be done in no time. Feeling entirely too much like I was at work already, I woke up and spent the next hour holding the cat. She didn't seem to mind too much.

My roll of Astroturf ordered off a the broken website turned up today, so my plans for the verandah can go ahead. Next comes the ladder, more woodchip paper removal (yay!) the new sink and the bitter fight against ancient encrusted layers of gloss paint. Anyone got any tips on that? (shermarama, I share your pain)

My courgettes are flowering like monsters but not setting a single squash. What's going wrong? Not enough food? Can someone wise in the ways of the squash please advise? I've had a go at pollinating them myself with a Japanese ink brush but to no avail

Making good progress on my strip for Ink + Paper which has now been beaten down to a typically dense five pages of thrilling Human Cannonball action. It's onto character sketches and dialogue honing now rather than watching The Cannon Lady on Youtube, but still fun.

Speaking of fun, I've just done my workshop description for Austerity Caption 2011:

Reuse, Recycle, Regurgitate

Which comics would you put in the blue box? From old favourites to comics you wish had never been born, bring along dupes, copies or even originals to be modified and mutilated in this open-access, drop-in drop-out collage workshop -- no art skills required. Join us as we remake comics history into brave new works of weird and twisted genius.

I suspect it'll be less workshop-leading, more making sure the younger convention members don't eat the pritt-stick or run with scissors, but it should be fun.

The new Modernist Disco electro night that timscience and others are putting on has scored a big favourite of mine for the headliner -- Gyratory System, you can buy tickets online here.