In a Central London hotel room I am communing with positive people. From the stage, a fitness expert leads us through an aerobic warm-up. Star jumps are tough on dodgy knees... Then it's down to the real business. Self-help through group ecstasy - the Billy Graham approach to success. Speakers arrive to a fanfare, extolling the virtues of self fulfilment and wealth. For Thatcher's generation, the one is unimaginable without the other. We're given free books. On how to become millionaires. A woman tells us she can turn us into butterflies. "Leave behind the corpses of your caterpillars. That is your past." I turn to my companion: "She means the chrysalis. The butterfly is the caterpillar." My mate nods distractedly. Inevitably, my mind wanders. Why should elephants have four knees? How long is a piece of string? Would the eccentric who turned down the Fields Medal also have refused a Gracie Fields medal? Finally, it's break time. And there's a competition! To win a whole weekend of self-improvement:-o Heading into the foyer, I celebrate the respite with apple and cucumber juice. My companion is of the happy-clappy persuasion. "I'd say," I venture, tentatively, "that there are better ways of spending a Wednesday night." She scans the room and nods. I have to run to keep up as she exits the building.

A sunny Sunday in Suffolk. My friend's bitser, suitably primped, has been entered at the local dog show. She parades haphazardly with pedigree mutts who trot upright and stiff-legged like City gents. The judge checks her teeth. She bares them and growls. He feels her stomach. She barks. He goes to lift her. She runs away. My friend is not one to give up. Her pooch is entered in four further rounds. For the pairs section, the owner of a large dog of indeterminate origin is invited to partner them. The two mutts stand side-by-side like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny De Vito in Twins. "Did you not realise they had to be matching dogs?" I hiss, as a minging pair of Border Terriers grab the prize. She's nonplussed: "They didn't say." Finally, in the Family Dogs section, there's success. The judge, I suspect, has made a sympathy call. Over dinner we relive the highlights. This includes a timed hurdles over a line of haybales. "They said our little darling was almost a good as a lurcher," my friend reports proudly. Her poor pet, meanwhile, has passed out in the corner.

Closing time at the Windsor Castle pub. Beneath a plate bearing a portrait of Princess Diana, my godson is in full flow: "I want to be naughty!" he bellows. With each round he has consumed a pint of Stella and a large JD with coke. "You know what I really fancy? Going to Sophisticats and doing drugs." I make polite inquiries. The former is a lapdancing club. And he has no immediate access to the latter. Taking my role seriously, I admonish him. "Then tell me what I can do that's bad," he demands, adding quickly: "I don't want to be unfaithful." I doubt he can hold his piece straight enough to hit the toilet bowl during his frequent loo breaks. The liklihood of his rising to a sexual challenge is unlikely at best, and suicidal at worst. I say nothing. But against my better judgement, I let him and his boring IT buddy, come back to mine. "I can't go home to that bitch just yet," my godson says. This is just as well. She's hung up on him twice... "Fuck her," he shouts. I wish you would, I think. It might shut her up. And you. Every fifteen minutes, he goes out for a fag break. And amuses himself sweeping the front window with the yard broom. We have a £10,000 bet on whether it's the original glass... At two, his mate leaves. At three, I call time on my godson. Finally, half an hour later, he lurches off into the dawn: "I need to find a pizza." And to think he was once a choir boy;-)

I have this running joke. I'm a girl who needs 8000 calories a day to keep her figure. It's not quite true, but close. Last week in the wilds of East Anglia - or Angular as Jade Goody once said - the progeny and I were force-fed like pigs being fattened for market. Our hostess, an old friend, is loving and generous to a fault. But she's a control freak. Like Cathy Bates in Stephen King's 'Misery'. Her husband is so infantilised he wears short trousers. He's 62. We were similarly smothered; ferried around the lowlands, stoked up on cooked breakfasts and vast three course dinners. One day we escaped. "I'm taking the girls out for a break," I said. At the front door, we were presented with a picnic. The rolls were labelled with our names. Leaving Norfolk six pounds heavier, I said: "That's it. Family hold back." But we had two parties in the diary. And empty cupboards. So I kept ordering home deliveries. This morning at six, the girls left for Leh. We had breakfast before I dropped them at the Heathrow Express. Back in a silent house, I moped. At ten, I had a second breakfast. Then I worked my way through a box of chocolates called Seven Deadly Sins. One chocolate for each sin: sloth, pride, anger, lust, envy... greed and gluttony. I am exploding out of my trousers. Not so much muffin top as nightmare at the bakery. Worse. Just now, I ate two chocolate medallions belonging to my eldest. "Save them for me, Mum," she said, as she headed off to the mountains. What kind of woman have I become? My child is on her way to the other side of the world, and I ate her sweeties before she'd even crossed Turkey:-(

On Friday we went to visit my aunt. Who runs an alternative centre in East Sussex. The courtyard of her house boasts a circular mosaic, thirty feet in diameter. It's the property's birth chart. The library houses thousands of books on world religions, spiritual guidance and new ways of being. One of the first things we did was stand in a circle and chant the Hindu om. "It sounds like a thousand voices, doesn't it?" she said. And it did. Many years ago I spent a weekend at the centre with UFO hunters. The highlight was a man who claimed to speak to aliens. As we sat there, he went into a trance. Making connections on several planes he passed on fantastically useful messages. For example: "It is cold here." The food was terrible too. This time round there was no cooking. "We're going out for lunch," said my aunt. Curry. In what appeared to be an Italian trattoria. Delicious. We then returned to her homestead for chocolate cake and strawberries. As we munched happily, she said, "I'm going to tell you a story." And quoted, word perfect, Tennyson's Lady Clare. We started off sniggering. By the end, the girls and I were spellbound. My aunt is 81. "She doesn't look any older than some of your friends," my eldest said on the way back. It is true. Maybe there's something to be said for communing with the gods in a rural idyll:-)

Smelly, brown and beautiful, the girls are back in town. This morning I took them for their jabs. Their Pa is hoiking them off to the Himalayas shortly. The youngest went in first, and was being set up for typhoid and Hep A as the eldest and I hoved into view. Two injections were expertly administered. "Over in no time," the nurse mused, moving the youngest to the other side of the room as the eldest took her place. A strangely meandering woman who had spelt Delhi as in telly, she wandered off to top-up on serum. "Don't they look alike? I keep forgetting which is which." My daughters are certainly similar. But one is dark skinned and blue eyed. And the other light skinned and brown eyed. And four inches broader. And three years older... This didn't stop the nurse refilling her syringes, approaching the newly jabbed youngest, now in the opposite corner of the room, and jabbing her again. As we collapsed in hysterics, unable to believe what had happened, she said: "Oh dear. Well it's only the typhoid. She's doubly safe now."

I missed the flight on Friday. Damn the M25:-o The next connection was at 06:00... The silver lining was the SInde commissioning a piece between my visits to Stanstead. The downside was my arrival at the chateau in a valium haze. I bolted down breakfast, disappeared into one of the 14 bedrooms, and slept till dinnertime. Horsehair mattresses! Fantastic! Around the fairylit outdoor dinner table were Swedes, Germans, an English ex-pat, and my hostess - Scottish-Lebanese from Sierra Leone. A number of the ensemble were, or had been, working in Afghanistan. The stories were hilarious. As were the tales of taming the crazed Dinka of Sudan, a trial most recently foist on my mate - a woman in whom they met their match... Halfway through the proceedings, she and her hubby disappeared. To an English neighbour's drinks party. They returned bewildered. "The women said there's a rule and I should have worn heels," she reported. "I told them I wear heels at work. When you're employing a thousand men, it helps to feel tall. At home, it's flatties only." Amused, we inquired how this information had gone down. The owner of the biggest pile for miles, shook her head in disbelief. "Not well. They'd clearly marked me down as a bushwoman with a rich husband."

A new name, a new concept, and suddenly all the pieces are falling into place. I bought a DIY website this morning. And wrote myself a new cheque to freedom, happiness and, hopefully, riches;-) In the middle of this a mate in France emailed. "Are you coming over tomorrow?" I'd ignored her earlier invitation. Because I'm broke financing my reinvention. And I've been out every night since the kids' went. Cocktails don't come cheap. I checked Ryanair and emailed back. "The fares have quintupled. So sorry, Darling. I can't." I finished the website, did some ironing, and prepared to go on the razz. Again. A new email arrived. "We've booked you on the 14.55. Our treat." Seconds later the flight confirmation came through. Gadzooks! My last trip on Ryanair was a nightmare. I had a panic attack on boarding. I felt completely trapped. And couldn't escape because I was. By zillions of people fighting for seats. In the morning, I'm off to the doctor for valium... Wouldn't it be great to always travel first class? My exceedingly good and generous mate, is certainly of that bent. Six years ago she was a single mum in Kilburn. Today she has a multi-million pound business in Dubai and a holiday chateau. Which is where I'm bound. Respect! And a little ooh-la-la, I hope;-)

Entering a Central London bar with my mate, I stopped in my tracks. Ahead of me was a hideously ugly woman. Hitting fifty with huge blonde and ginger hair extensions, she was the sort of old scrubber you'd find behind the bar at The Queen Vic. I clutched my companion's hand and hissed "That's xxxxx - you know, the one who ran off with your mate Caroline's husband." Edging our way around the emporium of delights we ordered drinks. "Hideous, isn't she?" I said, taking charge of a raspberry martini. "You wouldn't think he'd leave Caroline for someone like that." My mate shrugged. "It's her mouth," she said, sagely. "Those buck teeth. Men look at them and think about blow jobs." As I choked on this information, my mate used her champagne flute to demonstrate why men found looking down on buck teeth a turn on. She looked like Thumper wrestling a carrot from the ground. I have never considered the aphrodisiac qualities of a large overbite before. It's always struck me as rather precarious. How can one chew steak, for example? I finished my drink in one. To steady the nerves. Suddenly the object of our musings disappeared. "Gone to steal someone else's husband," I said. "Gone to scrub her knees," said my mate.

A joyful evening in Covent Garden with a new mate is temporarily halted by a sudden view of her underarm fuzz. Regular readers will know that I had a similar encounter during a women's meeting a few weeks back when I was left nonplussed, not just by the abundance of hirsute pits on display, but by the care with which the tresses had been combed. Tonight's follicular glories were curly - like pubic hair impishly transplanted by Puck during a fallout with Titania. I nearly inhaled my crayfish in horror. Moments like these are confusing for a feminist. How does one balance the personal with the political? Perhaps this is how Tony Blair feels when he sends his children across town to better schools than are found in Westminster? I finished my meal with a sense of deep guilt. I'm sure she wasn't judging me, and I look like a butterball turkey. What right did I have to judge her for sporting... merkins?

The kids are off to camp on Wednesday. In the meantime my office is their storeroom. The floor is littered with rucksacks, sleeping bags, tents, fleeces, billy cans, waterproofs, suncreams, walking boots and a huge pile of faux designer clothing. This belongs to my eldest. Who hones in on boys like a heat-seeking missile. She can't be seen traversing the Yorkshire cowpats actually looking like a camper. So half of Top Shop has been amassed. I have successfully vetoed the lined broderie anglais coat. But the white sneakers have sneaked through. This for a camp so basic, they pooh in a hand-dug lat. Emptying a large suitcase to accommodate her excess baggage, I came across some detritus from my own travels. Last year's abortive romancing in Laos. The Mekong is beautiful this time of year... Tomorrow we are dog-sitting. And my German sister-in-law, ex, arrives with two children in tow. Who are also going to camp. A woman with a heart of pure gold and a tongue of sharpened steel, she once bemoaned the lack of good daytime telly. "All they show is stupid war films, always making out the Germans are the baddies." Her Jewish husband nearly swallowed his spoon at this. His family, puce but ever gracious, moved the conversation swiftly on. Happy days:-)

Out in County Kilburn we pitched up at Rob Newman's latest show. Clever, passionate and funny, he is so... not funny. There is cynicism inherent in everything he says. Of course there were laughs. Some were inspired. But he managed, nonetheless, to end on an absolute downer. As if it it's our fault that idealism is dead and you can't buy Fairtrade lager. Perhaps it is - but we're victims too! He gave us the history of the world told backwards. A wonderful conceit and perfect for punters with several degrees including ancient civilisations, world politics, military strategy, nuclear fission and orthopaedic surgery. The rest of us only got forty per cent of the jokes. And pretended, or slept, through the rest. Sitting near the front, I had a view straight up his nostrils. His channels are very narrow. Funnily enough, he once kissed me. Rather... moistly. In a corridor at Jongleurs, in Clapham. It was a long time ago:-( I was encumbered that evening with a drunk who painted well but held drink badly. There was no opportunity to further the promise of romance as I was searching out friends to help me hoist him in the car and dump him at his midden. The drunk that is, not Mr Newman. I'd fantasized that our eyes would meet during tonight's show and we'd both get palpitations, but if it happened, it must have been while I was dozing. And yes, I'm tired. One child has finished school. The other - a joyous 15 yesterday - is enjoying an end of year social whirl. This is their weekend with their father. I waved them out of the door - correction: pushed them out of the door - with some relief. It's been one of those weeks. Tomorrow I have promised myself a lie-in:-)

Yesterday, I lunched with the schoolgate mums. One is a soprano and the other a plumber. Though the plumber is returning to IT. There was an ant in the salt and bits of clingfilm on my steak. The waitress noted both aberrations and shrugged. This morning I went to Waitrose. The last time I was there, I bumped a middle-aged man as he struggled a whining toddler into a trolley seat. Apologising, I helped him get her sorted. Meanwhile, a slightly larger child was kicking at his legs. "Have a good day," I said. He snarled. You could hear those kids whining all around the store. It was like living the Doppler effect. Daddy of course, was unfazed. I suppose, as the Mayor of London, he deals with far worse shit every day;-) But I digress. Today in the store, the service was surly beyond belief. And it was only half past eight! The cashier threw down my grapes. I could have sold them as Blue Nun nouveau. What's wrong with everybody? Every summer as we head for silly season, urban tensions increase. So much to do, so little time... Over puddings yesterday, we were discussing our own anxieties. The soprano's work is seasonal. The plumber gets more callouts for websites than toilets. And me - well, you know where I am in all this... Roll on August when a baffle board of calm falls on the great metropolis:-)

We're twenty minutes into the World Cup final. The phone goes. "Hello, it's Cathy from Radio Five Live." I politely explain it's the sporting fixture of the... every four years. "Sorry. I'll keep it short," she says. "We're having an education debate at midnight. Can you talk about single-sex schooling?" "I'm happy to," I reply politely, "but can we discuss it after the game?" We're ten minutes into extra time. The phone goes. "Hello it's Cathy from Five Live." I stay calm: "Cathy, the game's into extra time." "I know," she says. "That's why we're running late. We're postponing the debate till later in the week. Is that all right?" As I struggled out a polite farewell, my youngest said: "You really wouldn't expect a sports station to be ringing people during a cup final, would you?" Precisely. Thankfully, I was able to assuage any residual frustration when Zidane chest-butted one of the pretty Italian blokes. The whole game was like that pitiful eighties single Torn Between Two Lovers. I was torn between a mainly black team representing a racist nation, or a bung-implicated team representing a fascist nation. In the run-up, I'd opted to support France. I thought victory might be a unifying force. But it was Italy I kept cheering. Because they're small and fierce and cute. And they were the dog's bollocks in extra time against Germany. Now, the household can return to its natural state of football apathy. Making, of course, the odd exception for Liverpool (me) and Arsenal (youngest):-)

Writing a piece about my mum for a new anthology, I recalled how the tiny room in which we lived till I was thirteen, often held up to ten people at meal times. There was one armchair and a double bed. They'd perch around its edges or sit on the floor. My mum prepared feasts on a two ringed Belling cooker. We had jack shit, but what we had we shared. Our social life was one glorious whirl. Because our friends were the same. That support structure is still strong, forty years on. Earlier this week, my richest friend had a birthday dinner in Soho. For the first time I can remember, she paid. This was so out of character, the consensus was that she'd brokered a deal with the club owner. Not one guest believed she was doing it for the joy of giving. Because few people who can, do... What is it about money that it strips us of our internal lives? Our concerns change to the external. We cherish bank statements, the car, the holidays. The emphasis changes from giving to getting. It's easier to pay a happiness coach £100 an hour, than spend that amount generating happiness with others. My youngest is spending the weekend with an old mate: one of six kids in a small council flat. The dad, a postal worker, does nights so he can help after school. As she left, I handed over spending money. "Don't be silly," the mum said. "We're taking them to Margate tomorrow and doing a barbie on Sunday. She doesn't need money. We've got everything that's necessary." I watched them go enviously. Because they have:-)

Tuesday afternoon, I addressed a corporate press office on the finer points of video production. They were young and eager, aware that their pedigree in this dark art was embarrassing at best and losing them revenue at worst. Things started well. Lots of smiles and busy scribbling. Then came the crunch question. "How would you describe your main product and what are its applications?" Not one of them could answer comprehensively. Lots of headlines, no context. While this isn't unusual - it's much easier to describe the functions of a tumble dryer or a Rich Tea biscuit than a corporate service - it's fairly vital if you're in charge of external communications and busily commissioning videos. In the middle of the discussion, their boss arrived. It was like a dark shadow had entered the room. Individual lights started going out. I explained that we were defining the product in terms of video representation. She argued every point. Her premise was that the nature of their service made even conventional competence in this area, impossible. She was smart. She argued from every angle. And then, inevitably, concluded in accordance with what was being suggested. We'd then continue happily for a few minutes and off she went again... Stoically, I fought off death from both frustration and heat stroke and emerged triumphant. By the time I headed back out into the sun, there was a raging discussion about their USP. Once that's sorted, the rest is simple - communicating properly is an art, not a science. In the meantime, I'm happy to keep going back and putting them on track;-)

On Saturday night, after our ignominious departure from German shores - what a twat that doughball Rooney, is - and an uplifting episode of Dr Who - uplifting because Rose is at last on her way out - I set foot for Hoxton. Once a hotbed of NF activity, it is now an arty hub surrounded by ringroads and fit blokes who read The Guardian. I was hot to trot. But... on entering our comedy club of choice, my mate and I found the punters consisted of four large hen parties and three couples. The local boys were in the Dog and Duck weeping into their beers. The only single man was a blow up doll with an enormous penis. Right totem, wrong consistency. There was also a woman with inflated boobs that sat solidly in her lycra top like the Elgin Marbles. We disgraced ourselves by making laddish remarks about being smothered to death and deploying her as a scud missile. The first act was a former teacher who, having failed to raise the youth of our country to new highs, similarly failed with the over 25s. The second was a gay muslim GP intent on hitting all the discomfort buttons. He was so clever-clever you needed a degree to get half his jokes, but he was funny. Finally, a middle-aged Aussie with a Stratocaster took the stage. Within seconds she had stripped off to display her flab. In a room of women, this was the equivalent of baring one's soul. Alternately embarrassed and delighted, we were then reduced to hysterics by her Shirley Bassey skit. There are times when the absence of men is a deeply affirming experience:-)

Yesterday I was invited to lunch at The Hilton. On a blind date. The banker I was meeting turned out to be a bovver boy. He had a number two haircut and was wearing a white shirt and black trousers. Banker? I'm guessing the rest of his uniform was in the cloakroom. We got the lift to the 28th floor. Food will help, I thought. On arrival, he guided me away from the restaurant and into the bar. Not a word was said. I ordered a sherry. And sat on my seat edge, ready to do a FloJo. I explained away my obvious discomfiture, saying the hotel's outrageous car park charges had given me palpitations. We made small talk. Suddenly, apropos nothing, he said loudly: "You're every man's nightmare. You're obsessive and demanding. In a relationship, I can see you'd be the taker." Nonplussed, I sought diversion. I told him humorously about the mum who'd joined Sugardaddie.com. "Why don't you do that?" he said. "You're obviously high maintenance." And there's the proof that everything is relative:-o When I ventured that I was a tad mature and heavy for the average zillionaire, he looked me up and down. "You could do it." I felt a lot lighter when I left him, that's for sure. Bizarrely, he disappeared down Park Lane, promising to give me some contacts at Merrill Lynch. "You know your stuff and they need the help," he said. I still don't know what to make of it:-o

I asked my eldest, agog, why she had volunteered to spend a week with the army. She was nonplussed: "To meet boys, of course." Today, in pouring rain, I dropped her and a classmate off at the barracks. It's part of their work experience... The car was routinely searched. As I opened the boot, the squaddie's jaw dropped. Each girl had a case the size of the Rosetta Stone. Four nights; ten changes of clothes. Every night is party night in Aldershot... I went to the office to register them and swooned. There is something about men in uniform. It's primal. I experienced three coup de foudres in four minutes. Fickle heart! Leaving the girls to their grisly fate, I headed home smiling. I thought about the youngest. Who is off to Calais in the morning. Quelle horreur: I suddenly realised her passport was in Oxford. With her father:-o Which explains my tryst in the Holiday Inn car park by High Wycombe roundabout, an hour ago. It was like a scene from All the President's Men - two figures emerging from the shadows for the furtive handing over of documents and cash. Thirty Euros;-) Driving back, I stopped to buy the little one a BP packed lunch. And ended up buying a packed breakfast too. She leaves at six. A mother has to draw the line somewhere...

My business partner has sent me an email: "You at a whiteboard with twelve people in the room, is like watching Freddie Mercury doing an intimate evening at Ronnie Scott's. You belong onstage at Wembley." What sauce! I can't see myself as the Billy Graham of language. I'd come out in hives if the punters started talking in tongues:-o Was it the Rev Sun Moon that ran harems and drove around his compound in a Rolls? That's more my sort of thing. Except I'm hideous in orange and I don't suit robes. What's a guru anyway? It's just a touchy-feely euphemism for consultant-on-a-soapbox. Hideously rich consultant-on-a-soapbox. One of my friends once took a soapbox at Hyde Park Corner. She was fighting the big birds' cause. It fell apart when she got heckled. "Why is dating a fat woman like owning a moped?" asked a wag. "Because they're both a good ride, but you don't want your mates to see you with one!" At this juncture we made our excuses and left, as they say in the News of the World. Funnily enough, a flyer came through the door recently, inviting us to some guru-fest at West Ham football ground. Maybe that's all it's good for since they lost the cup final;-) There's only one game we'll be watching this weekend. That's tomorrow at three. We've taken Paracetamol to cool our World Cup fevers. Today, far more girlie pursuits beckon. Brent Cross here we come:-)