Another week flew past, which started with Watchmen, middled with parentals' return and is ending with a lot of writing, mucho restructuring of the workspace and generally doing the organisational thang that I've suddenly found myself enjoying after years of 'pile-filing'.

Friday was one of those days when I couldn't decide if I was being an old fogey or whether the world is just full of ignorant people. I got the bus into Leeds where two girls switched on their mobile phones and played music. Loudly. I've always wanted to kill the person who thought cell-phones that played music even without optional speakers, but I try to ignore as I remember that, hey, I was once a kid too. And I know all kids, as my friend Karen pointed out, don't do this and even if they did, life's too short to sweat the small stuff. I agree. Still. In this case, the girls were in their mid-twenties and about five minutes into listening to their music (sampling I think about thirty different tracks), one said 'Turn it up a bit and see how long it takes people to complain!' This of course is the ultimate dilemma for we Britons - to actually maintain the stiff upper lipiness or actually say 'Bugger this, whether I fulfil the stereotype or not, yes, turn it down, you silly cow because, no, not all of us DO want to listen to it! Just put the fucking ear-phones in!'

Moot point as they eventually got off. Which is what I tried to do... and would have done had the bus not gone the compeltely wrong route through Leeds City Centre. The passengers looked at each other, established we weren't all morons and approached the driver who shrugged, seemed to admit a mistake and travelled up another few roads to get us back on track. When I got up to get off, the bus pulled into a stop that the bus shouldn't stop at and was a hundred yards from where it was supposed to. The driver look confused again and started talking in what sounded like Russian or Polish. I pointed to the stop far ahead and he shrugged and pulled out again- only to pull in at another stop around fifty yards away. At this point I actually asked the guy what the hell he was doing and he started swearing at me in whatever foreign language he was using. Deciding that I wasn't getting anywhere - literally - I got off where we were as he gesticulated at me and possibly insulted my heritage. I turned around, said 'Learn to drive in English' and walked off - not caring if it sounded racist and wondering if it was all some strange planetary alignment.

People who know me the best know I can wild and crazy or calm and considered as the company requires and it actually takes a lot to get me riled - and, frankly, I really don't mind people being morons... I just wish they wouldn't converge on me.

I don't mind being forty. It's the new thirty. But I utterly loathe people who actually make me feel it...