Today is going to be a better day than anticipated.

My office PC works fine, including e-mail and internet access, but every telephone in the ODPM is dead. I don't know what happened, and I don't care. No telephone distractions all day, and just to be sure, I have switched my mobile off.

I can hack away at various pieces of work in splendid isolation, listening to MP3s on my Walkman without fear of interruption. This is, of course, a GOOD THING. The only blot on today's landscape is that I am both short of coffee, though I have enough to see me to lunchtime, and the water heater is acting up, so my next cup of coffee will get a boost from the microwave before I take it back to my desk. That can be a fun procedure if not done properly; best mix the coffee in the water before nuking it. I learnt sometime back that to nuke the water and then add the coffee meant that it would instantly froth up like something from Quatermass and strip a couple of layers of skin from the unsuspecting hand. A teabag introduced top water in a similar fashion has similarly impressive results. Of course, for that full mad scientist effect, I recommend leaving the teaspoon in the cup and setting the microwave to maximum. I'm not sure that the city lights will dim momentarily, but they ought to.

I have to restrain myself from nipping across the HMV in Victoria station at lunchtime and buying the new Goldfrapp album. - Yes, Bryan buying alternative electronica. Is this the end of civilisation as we know it? (all I can say is that I have traded up my guilty musical secret from Andy Williams, OK?).

Back to work.