I’ve had a busy week what with one thing and another so here’s a bit of a round up with pictures and also excessive amounts of mawkish nonsense.

But what do all those apparently unrelated pictures at the top of this post MEAN?! I hear you all cry. Don’t worry, I’m going to explain it all now…

1. NARS Super Orgasm face illuminator. I’ve wanted this for ages but finally managed to buy one this week, which would have been pretty mundane except it sparked the following AWKWARD exchange in the Bristol branch of Harvey Nichols as the Space NK mua slapped it onto my cheeks and tried to make conversation, while at the same time I was trying to think of a funny and not at all crass way to tweet that I had ‘super orgasm on my face’. I didn’t manage this.

Her: ‘Oh, this makes you look all glowy but not TOO glowy. So you don’t, like, look like you come from Essex.’

Me: ‘I do come from Essex actually.’

Awkward silence.

Her: ‘Oh. Well. You don’t look like you do.’

I suppose I ought to be pleased that I don’t look like I come from Essex but I’m actually pretty proud of my home county so maybe not. What do you think someone from Essex looks like? Actually, on second thoughts, don’t answer that…

2. I went to see the TRULY AWESOME ‘Citizens and Kings’ exhibition at the Royal Academy a few years ago but due to being rubbish have only just managed to get hold of a copy of the enormous and rather gorgeous catalogue. This is a MUST BUY for all fans of late 18th and early 19th century grand portraiture. They even brought David’s painting of the dead Marat over to London for the occasion. Incredible and so powerful.

3. This is my viewing for the week – The Queen’s Sister, a drama about Princess Margaret starring Lucy Cohu, whom I have a bit of a crush on and also Bertie & Elizabeth, starring James Wilby who will ALWAYS be Maurice to me. Oh and also Sydney Carton. Remember that clip I posted last week. THE TEARS. THE WOODEN FACED LUCIE MANETTE. Pick me Sydney Carton! Etc.

4. Butter London nail polish in ‘Victoriana’. This is apparently ‘reminiscent of the Victorian era…corsets, top hats and Syphilis’. It’s actually a really pretty pale blue loaded with silver glitter. I dunno, does that remind you of syphilis? At a push it could be the blue unhealthy lips of someone dying from consumption?

5. Me! in my current favourite dress, which is blue and covered in stars. It’s GORGEOUS. I’m a sucker for anything with a star print as evidenced by previous collages. The best star thing I own is still my glittery peacock coloured star hair band from Janine Basil though. I want to marry it.

6. The 3 Year Old on a dinosaur. He had his first school trip last week, which was awesome. It was sad too though as it was on the third anniversary of my mother in law’s suicide. My husband was off work that day and surprised us by coming to the Zoo to meet us as he was feeling so sad and needed cheering up. We’ll get there one day.

7. My desk right now THIS VERY MINUTE. I’m a bit obsessed with Egypt while I write this book. The book at the top came this morning and is a study of European tourism to Egypt since the 18th century. Amazing. We’re going to Egypt sometime next year and I can’t wait! It looks like we’re going to be doing a few days in Cairo and then the rest of the week in Luxor.

8. Cupcake pink hair dye because I need to redo my hair before we head to Camp Bestival next week!

9. The SS Great Britain in Bristol is still my favourite place in our city. We keep going back to see the engine machinery going – it’s completely fascinating.

10. Another Butter London nail polish, this time in Rosie Lee, which is rhyming slang for ‘tea’. This isn’t tea coloured though, it’s a very dense pink glitter.

11. Due to babysitting issues, my husband and I don’t get to go out much in the evenings (we get out maybe once a year, usually to see a Stewart Lee gig, otherwise we go out with other people while the other stays in – I know, boo hoo etc) so instead we go out for breakfast together while both boys are at school in the morning. This is actually really nice. This particular breakfast was at Giraffe in Bristol last week, which also happened to be our last breakfast because he just got a promotion at work and won’t be doing shifts any more from next month. Woe.

12. My husband and the 3 Year Old on the way back from the Zoo. I’m a bit besotted with my family. I tweeted the other day about how I fell hook, line and sinker for my husband on our second date (well visit as I was living in Nottingham and he in Leeds at the time) when he turned up with a selection of his favourite books for me to read and asked for some of mine in return. He got all abashed when loads of women on Twitter started swooning over such romanticism and retweeting this. Still, I hope it gave a few guys a bit of a pointer on how to woo a book loving lady! I think it only works if the books are good though – I can’t see anyone being bowled over by an exchange of The Da Vinci Code and Fifty Shades of Grey…

Ahem.

Anyway, we’ve been enjoying the sunshine over the last couple of days with a trip out to Gloucester Road, which is the only bit of Bristol that reminds me of my beloved Whitechapel, for me yesterday and a quick visit to the Bristol Harbourside Festival this afternoon. It was hideously busy though so we didn’t last long before coming home. We DID, however, go on the Royal Navy mine sweeper that was in the harbour, which was really interesting. There were guns and everything.

I wrote a blog post about my novels and the inspirations behind them for History In An Hour last week. Some of you may enjoy this!

This week’s music is the Kloq Remix of ‘Everything I Made’ by my favourite band, Mesh. I listen to this all the bloody time when I’m writing. I love it though. The lyrics could be about me. Yeah, I know, when I DO go out, I am THAT woman. You know the one. The ‘THIS SONG IS ALL ABOUT ME’ one.

I keep remembering every so often that I’m seeing Fields of the Nephilim in October and having to do a little squeal of excitement. FIELDS OF THE NEPHILIM.

Yeah, that was me. I hang my head in shame. While changing an imaginary lightbulb and doing a simultaneous two step.