The Diary of a Nobody

Being the modern day record of Charles Pooter VI -
direct descendant of the 19th Century original

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Great news. Barry Perkupp’s sorted out some post for Lupin, and he’s going to go in and talk it through next week. What a relief. I went up to Lupin’s room to give him the good news, but he was in bed and looking dire, so I decided to tell him about it in the evening.

Barry Perkupp

Lupin said he’d joined a group called the Comedy Kings at the King’s Head in Holloway. He’d had a good night there, but he’d been sitting right underneath the air conditioning, and as a result he’d got a migraine. He didn’t want any breakfast, so I left him to it.

In the evening, I dug out a decent bottle of Cava in readiness for the big announcement. I charged our glasses. “Lupin” I said “I’ve some excellent news for you. Barry Perkupp’s managed to get you a job”. Lupin said “Cool” and we downed the Cava.

Lupin then said “Top them up. I’ve got some excellent news for you too”. I felt a bit uneasy, as did Carrie. She said “I hope we’ll think it’s excellent”. Lupin said “Of course you will! I’m engaged!”

Lupin said, “Of course you will! I’m engaged!”

Friday, October 30, 2009

I spent a quiet evening in with Carrie. It’s always nice, just the two of us. We chatted about an article on marriage in one of the papers titled “Wedded Boredom”. There’s been no question of boredom for us. Not at all. We got so engrossed in talking about loads of happy memories that we never noticed it was past midnight. We were startled when the front door slammed violently. Lupin was back. He stamped straight up to bed without turning off the hall light or even looking in on us. I called to him to come down for a minute, but he just shouted “Sorry. Knackered. ‘Night”. If he was knackered, he had a weird way of showing it. For half an hour he was banging about in his room singing at the top of his voice. I couldn’t work out what. All I could gather was that someone’s sex was on fire.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

That thing yesterday – “retired tired” – quite funny. I didn’t notice it at the time. If I wasn’t so anxious about stuff right now, I’m sure I’d have been able to make a gag out of it. I spoke to the carpet guy, who said he’d only moved the router and hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary. I’d be happy to pay someone – anyone – to get this sorted. Bloody computers.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Got an e-mail from Barry Perkupp saying he reckons there might be a job going for Lupin, which cheered me up a bit. I’ve been fed up at having lost these files, and really annoyed at all the futile approaches to companies I’ve been making on Lupin’s behalf. Spoke to Anya who said she’d never used a computer, wouldn’t know how to, and certainly wouldn’t touch mine.

I said I was determined to get to the bottom of it, and she said she’d do her best to help sort it out. She remembered a guy who’d been fixing the carpet at one point knocking a plug out and then fiddling with the computer afterwards, so maybe that was it. I’ll call him tomorrow. I wish Carrie hadn’t given Lupin a key. We never see him. I sat up until well past one, and eventually retired tired.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

The past five or six weeks of my diary have disappeared from the “My Documents” folder. It’s a nightmare! When I bought the computer at PC World, I made a point of choosing one with a large hard drive, so I’d have plenty of space for my files.

I asked Carrie if she knew anything about it. She said it was my own fault for leaving the computer on all day with all and sundry wandering about, including Anya (the cleaner). I said that wasn’t an answer to my question (pretty smart of me, I think). It would have had a bit more impact if I hadn’t knocked a vase off the table at the same time. It smashed.

Carrie got really upset: it was one of a pair we’d had given to us as a wedding present by Mrs Burtsett, an old friend of her cousins (the Pommertons) in Dalston, and there was no way we’d be able to replace it. I rang the technical support people at PC World who were completely useless and asked if I’d been making regular backups (which I hadn’t). Noticed in my internet history that various Polish sites had been visited recently. So someone Polish has clearly been using my machine. I shall have to speak to Anya when she’s here next.

Why shouldn’t
I publish
my diary?

I often see memoirs by people I’ve never even heard of and I don’t see why my diary should be any less interesting, just because I’m not a ‘celebrity’. I only wish I’d started it when I was younger.

Charles Pooter
The Laurels, 32 Elmside,
Barleycorn Mead, Harrow on the Hill.
charles@charlespooter.com