Blue Monday

How do you wake up ? Maybe your partner whispers softly in your ear, perhaps the kids, dog or cat come barging in, or the radio alarm goes off and John Humphries picks an argument. Any of those would be preferable to being woken at 6 a.m. by a 750cc motorbike starting up 20 metres from your head, the owner leaving the engine running for a good five minutes while he popped in and out of his house before roaring up the street, setting off car alarms.

After a crap start to the day, it didn't get much better. The gales had smashed an olive pot in the night, the queue at the bank was longer than I can ever remember, the grocer had run out of free range eggs, the bloke in the pet shop indulged the elderly woman for aions before serving me and it poured with rain, making cycling round this city of petrolheads a nightmare.

To be honest, I was in foul mood before I went to sleep. The tenants next door were shrieking and banging about at 1 a.m. and Guy Garvey had been a self-important prick on 6 Music, after an evening of repeats on the telly.

Psychologists with even more time on their hands than me, have deduced that the worst day of the year is around the 21st-24th January, so unless things are going to get worse, I've peaked ten days early.

Worst Day : Google

Still, I came across some excellent electronica from Sensiva a guy from the north of Russia whose album Giosun sounds a bit like Boards Of Canada and helped dry my bones.