The kids on the train this morning were talking about some kid in their class who got stabbed on Monday, but has now been released from hospital. The consensus seemed to be that there must have been at least 25 people who saw it happen, so plenty of people know who done it, and there will therefore be no problem 'sorting it out' later. Mmmmmm - I feel safer already.

I’ve had a bad cold recently and it’s had a really weird side effect. No, apart from using a small forest of tissues mopping up the fluids leaking out of me from all points (hardly weird is it?) - my hearing has improved dramatically!

For nearly a year I’ve had a terrible ear canal problem. Despite the repeated use of drops, sluicing, syringing etc it just wouldn’t stay clear. A few years ago I had an antibiotic resistant eardrum infection that caused some problems too although I did manage to get rid of it eventually. All these added up to me being at least 50% deaf in one ear. However, having had this wicked head cold and going virtually completely deaf during it I have now recovered, and amazingly my hearing has come back as well. The world now seems . . . LOUD. I can hear my colleagues bitching about me and everything. In fact yesterday I heard something despite being 8 yards away that someone 2 yards away didn’t hear. In fact my hearing seems almost unnaturally acute, almost like . . . Daredevil.

For mild mannered Panachetta it was strictly business as ususal. Cruelly struck down in the prime of life (33) by an excess of waxy build up he seemed doomed to spend the rest of his life shouting ‘What?’ in noisy bars. But when a freak head cold left him with powers he had never dreamed of it seemed like a dream come true, until one day the terrible truth dawned on him. He was slowly but irresistibly turning into Ben Affleck.

Christ. I think that’s the first time I’ve written something that has genuinely scared me.