Awake at an ungodly hour – even before daughter –  cursing our continued failure to sort out blackout lining for our bedroom curtains; exactly as per last summer and the summer before. A morning of pottering around the house, failing to make a cyanotype print (either it just doesn’t work indoors on a cloudy day or the paper’s gone off), listening to records (including multiple plays of a newly arrived Northern Soul 7″ of the sort that I really must not start collecting) and giving too much inconclusive thought as to why I just can’t bring myself to love The Band’s Music From Big Pink in the same way that I love, say, The Basement Tapes or The Band.

Then, as the clouds shifted and the temperature went up, off on my bike to a surprisingly quiet Charlton Lido for a slow-ish mile’s swim. Then round to the Old Cottage Cafe in Charlton Park and had a not-nutritionist-recommended coffee and cake to recover.

Spotted one of the bonkers ‘Legal Name Fraud’ posters off Charlton Rd – whoever is behind them must have a lot of cash, or the billboard advertising industry really is on its knees. Later an exciting trip out to buy a non-symbolic new broom (Dad tip: B&Q is alway quiet at 5.30 on a Saturday).

In between I’ve been listening to the New Daniel Romano album as prep for Monday night’s gig in Oxford. It surprises me that reviews of his recent work don’t all mention Lee Hazlewood straight up in the first paragraph, which is not to be critical: more artists in that kind-of-Americana world would benefit from looking at songwriting and production from a Hazlewood angle.

A reasonable way to start a Bank Holiday weekend, all in all.