Eminem sold his house for $475,000 two years ago. The guy who bought it put it up for sale on eBay. The winning bid? $99.9 million

It’s Sunday, which means I have to be at LBC to present London this Week. It’s Sunday, which means it’ll rain from the moment I leave the tube until the point I arrive at ITN, and probably do the same - only harder - on the way back home.

Sure enough, the weather lived up to expectations.

I arrived early enough to read the papers in time for the first interview, which was slated for recording at eleven. Found, instead, that I’d been robbed of a producer by problems with teeth, so settled down with coffee and toast to write my cues and look scour the net for gossip on my guests.

The morning flew by, as it always does, the recording went well, and my theme was playing before it felt it should. With ads and promos were running about four minutes late, but we dropped in the recording, and picked up time on the rest, which was all live, and as it turned out pretty much everything was just the length it ought to be.

Headed off to Oxford Street to buy Christmas cards and wrapping paper once I’d done, but got myself distracted by shiny objects in the shops and finished off the Christmas shopping, which is a good thing. It rained, of course, all afternoon.

Now all I need to do is wrap. And write the cards and post them.

And make my paper chains.

Notes:

1. Al Gore, 54, the man who won 500,000 more votes than George ‘W’ Bush at the last election yet was denied the job he deserved by the so-called ‘Supreme’ Court has decided not to run for the job in 2004.

2. Jerry Springer Christmas Special on TV this evening after The Hand that Rocks the Cradle finished. Mother tells her son she’s sleeping with his wife. She gives him a wrapped nightdress - the one she wears when she sleeps with his wife.

All of my financial details - my credit card numbers, back account numbers and sort codes, passport and driving licence numbers - and all the questions necessary to use them, including my name, address, and the answer to the ubiquitous ‘mothers maiden name’ question and in an easily identified envelope in a post box that is not emptied on Sundays somewhere in the Chelmsford area. They’ll stay there until first collection Monday, unless someone reverses into it or it blows down in the wind again like it did last time we had a storm.

You see, I fell for the scare stories about having all your cards registered so if you lose them, or your wallet is stolen, you just ring one number and they’re all cancelled right away, and it only struck me how stupid the whole thing was when I was filling out the registration papers. Anyone who sees the envelope will know exactly what’s inside, so I’m putting my faith, and my financial wellbeing in the hands of the postman - and countless other postmen and women - not to peep inside and go wild in the (vitrual) aisles online.

That was the pinnacle of a day of finances. Registered myself for an online tax return (far more involved than last year), closed another bank account, took great delight in cutting up my Barclaycard now I’ve switched to a more attractive brand of credit. Sellotaped the little bits together so there wouldn’t be any nasty sharp edges and dropped them into an envelope addressed to Northampton.

Took panettone around to mum’s for tea. While there discovered that Christmas is only a week and a half away.

Must buy cards.

Either Amazon has introduced a new feature or I’ve not noticed it before. On the front page, where it suggests things you might like to buy, it now has a link that explains why it made its recommendations. Today, it suggested Perl Harbour, because I bought Shrek and Bridget Jones in the past. Both were presents for other people. Tell it to ignore them and it comes up with Jeffrey on account of having bought Queer as Folk - again as a present for someone else. Tell it to ignore that and… well, eventually it gives up. And just throws up three random suggestions. The ironic things is that all three are DVDs I would happily part with cash to get my hands on.

Most of my Amazon shopping is for other people so the books and films it recommends on the basis of past experience are of no interest to me. So wouldn’t a ‘disown’ box, where you could shirk the responsibility of having ordered tasteless or embarassing books (Jamie Oliver, anyone?) and blame it on the festive season boost sales massively over the rest of the year?

I had the option of an afternoon or morning meeting today and stupidly - last week, without thinking it out - picked the morning session. I really really didn’t want to hear the alarm when it went this morning. In spite of the fact I sat perched on the side of the bed, slowly sipping my way to the bottom of a hot drink before even thinking about the shower I still made it to London twenty minutes early, and walked around in the rain trying to read my rapidly disintegrating map.

I found where I was supposed to be, and was greeted with tea and biscuits and lovely warm radiators to dry out my coat.

It was well worth the effort, though. I was there for a usability seminar on making sites more accessible to physically disabled or visually impaired users. I was shocked how inaccessible some of the sites I use every day turned out to be when we ran them through screen readers. Was relieved to see mine works fairly well, being very light on the graphics. It’s inspired me to tweak it over Christmas, though, and make sure it can be read by all.

Was shocked to find that 20% of all school children (and by inference 20% of all people everywhere) have some form of special need, ranging from complete inability to use a keyboard or mouse so they have to use special buttons or sticks, to simple colour blindness that makes it difficult to discern some text colours on top of certain backgrounds.

This is bad news for Apple, as Windows is currently far better equipped to work with things like screen readers. Trouble is, they cost around

OK, so it all started yesterday lunchtime. Lunch with Neil, much chat about the stuff we did together at BBC Three Counties, gossip about house buying, publishing and radio. Back to the office for the afternoon, then out to the office Christmas party.

It was at the CC Club beneath the Trocadero. Venue of the Big Brother after-show party et al. Very convenient for us all, and VERY LOUD. Kathryn, Emilie and I made a pact not to dance. We were plied with stupid amounts of free champagne, though, and within thirty minutes were up on the podium jiggling about to some truly awful tracks.

Not much in the way of meat-free food and a couple of hundred journalists all letting off steam in an enclosed environment all conspired to get me very dizzy very quickly. As far as I can remember - and nobody can remember all that much - there wasn’t much in the way of gossip, but I woke up this morning with a very thick head, knees that ached from several hours of uncoordinated and inelegant dancing, and a rather stiff neck. Oh, and rather late for work.

It seems I wasn’t the only one suffering. Between us we could claim six thick heads, three stiff necks and several ringing ears. Mine are still chirping away to themselves even now.

Emilie brought in croissants to make us feel better, and we cracked open a bottle of champagne mid-morning, then headed out to Belgo for Christmas lunch.

Belgo Covent Garden is very much like the Industrial Zone in the Crystal Maze. Lots of chicken-wire and thick metal mesh, and row upon row of long tables and hard wooden benches. It was made slightly less Crystal Maze like through the addition of several hundred cash ‘n’ carry crackers and the strange monk-like outfits worn by the waiters.

So more eating, more drinking and more taking of photos - many of them painfully embarassing. An official snap of each member of the team by the person sat opposite, pretty much everyone wearing the comedy moustache and fingernails out of the crackers and, as the afternoon wore on, our faces getting longer and more drawn as the excesses of the last 24 hours, and the lack of sleep, kicked in.

We decamped to Freedom, the micro-brewery across the road, and flopped down on the long comfy seats, where we stayed for the next four hours, the size of the group slowly dwindling until eventually there was only four of us left. I was up for heading out to find a coffee shop, but a few swift calls and a cold walk across Soho found us at the IBM Christmas party in the Sun and 13 Cantons with a guy who bore a striking resemblance to Morten Harkett.

The Sun and 13 is a very cramped little pub, and a strange place for a party. We stayed 20 minutes before heading up Poland Street to the Text 100 party in Porters, and during that time at least two glasses got knocked off tables and smashed on the floor by people passing by, heading for the loos.

Porters - not my favourite place by a long shot - was far more pleasant. Room to sit down, and a steadly supply of free drinks and - eventually - food. Cheesy tortillas, dippable pitas, and chips coated in head-blowing chilli powder. I taught Susie, Kathryn and Emilie a trick with the books of matches left on the table and pretty much everyone burnt their fingers trying to copy. Susie, somehow, managed to get the burning head of a match stuck to her fingers as it flared up. Flicking her wrists to knock it off she threw it onto the sleeve of Morten Harket’s jacket. He jumped up in a panic and the still-flaring head dropped to the floor leaving a small white mark on his arm.

Stumbled in the vague direction of a train home around eleven and have set my alarm for a foolish time in the morning. I have a meeting in Westminster I could well do without.

Spam. How annoying. Still, in the run-up to Christmas it can be useful to be offered unsolicited products for sale. A small selection of the 120(ish - I’ve stopped counting) items people have tried to sell me by email today include:

toilet paper … kitchenware … cigarette lighter … drilling rigs for use on an oilfield … office furniture …. a submarine … motorbike … leather shoes … saloon car … concrete mixing truck … ocean-going oil tanker … underwear

Ever wondered why your phone still works in a power cut? It’s because the phone company pumps its own electric supply down the line, completely separate from the national grid. Now one company, Mike Sandman Enterprises, is taking advantage of this by offering a range of products that can be plugged into phone sockets and powered for free. Great for saving money, and even better in a power-cut, allowing you to light lights, charge electric toothbrushes and even run a glow-in-the-dark electric vibrator. I guess they got the idea from vibrating phone ring-tones.

RELAX! Glow in the Dark Vibrator is easy to find when the power is out.

There’s a lot of stress when the power is out! Use our soothing Vibrator to relax your muscles after dealing with this serious problem. Use it as long as you need to… it’s powered by the phone company!

Last time I was in LA, I had to walk down eight flights of stairs with two big bags to check out of the hotel that had been without power twice during my stay. The vibrator would have really helped my muscles after that stressful hotel stay!

Woke up with a sore throat and a nasty thick head. Not good for a Sunday. Dragged myself out of bed, with some effort, and dropped some vitamin C tablets into a mug of hot water. Showered while they fizzed away to nothing and gulped it down as I ran out the door.

So, with the start of a cold I wasn’t on top form for the show. The hour always flies by other weeks, but the first and last segments today, both with comedians looking at the news or stuff going on in London this week, left me feeling a little detached, and were very hard work.

The ITN canteen was out of the Echinacea tea that’s supposed to boost your immune system, too, so I was already feeling jittery from bucketloads of coffee on an almost empty stomach. Still, it could have been worse. Last time I was in that building with a cold I was threatened with having my nostrils syringed so I’d sound fine on air. What that involves, I have no desire to find out.

A brief chat with Marcus and Sam, then grabbed some food on the way out and headed for Oxford Street by foot to meet Jon, Trevor and Paul. Bumped into them, purely by chance, outside John Lewis, where they were standing on a corner to call me. My phone was merrily singing away to itself in my backpack, but with so many people on the streets there was no chance of hearing a thing.

We decamped to Selfridges for tea and cake, and to get out of the cold. I wasn’t in much of a mood for shopping, so was happy to sip slowly until we eventually headed out again into the bitter cold air of Oxford Street for a last trawl of the shops before they shut up for the night.

HMV did its rather naff ‘this store will close in five … (four … three … two … one) minutes’ countdown in the run-up to six, at which point I left the three of them to hunt down a bowl of pasta, and headed for the tube, the train, and a hot bath to take care of my cold.

But I didn’t get to the bath quite as soon as I’d hoped.

My timing was perfect, in more ways than one - I got to the station with enough time to grab a coffee to drink on the train and then bumped into a friend I’ve not seen in seven or eight years when he got on further down the line and sat in the seat across the aisle. He didn’t have a clue who I was, so was quite shocked when I leant across to recite his name and address. By then we were already pulling into Chelmsford, so we got off together and I drove him three stops down the line so we could talk some more.

Seems he’s spent the last three years living in Australia. Office overlooking Sydney Opera House. Rooftop apartment from which he was able to watch the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympic Games.

Am I jealous?

Hmmm…

A vague lay-in interrupted by dad on the phone. I think he often thinks Britain is on the same time as France, so calls an hour earlier than he should. A shocking way to wake up, on account of the fact the answerphone grabbed the call and I had to run from warm-bed to cold lounge to recsue him from the tedium of distorted digital recording.

Passed the morning at the PC, trawling through old editions of The Lab and picking out best-of bits for a pre-Christmas compilation. Lots of fun, and plenty of bits that made me smile. Found just over 11 minutes of amusing bits and bobs, and laced them together. Just need to sort out the levels so they are all happy volumes, and it’s done.

Mooched into town to retrieve my car from the station where I’d left it last night after the party. It was being used as an obstacle by the skateboarders who clearly realise that nobody watches the security cameras.

Town was horribly busy, as is to be expected at this time of year. Christmas shopping is the worst bit of Christmas. I ended up coming home empty handed, but am almost finished anyway.

Car safely back in my posession, I drove down to see Mark and Ja in South Woodham Ferrers. Peter, Ystabub and the other Nick turned up in due course for videos and food. We ended up watching an episode of Sex and The City, and Mark’s recording of the 1990 Eurovision Song Contest.

It was held in Yugoslavia that year, on a shiny stage in a nasty sports centre-like building in Zagreb. Several cock-ups: Spain went on first and the non-live backing track was exposed when the girls walked on and the music faded in a minute later. They did some lacklustre dancing then stormed off. They couldn’t get in touch with the Yugoslav jury, which was voting from the same city as the studio hosting the contest, and then when the winner (Italy) performed his song again at the end he caused havoc by walking out into the audience, trailing the press pack behind him. They started to clamber over the audience members, kicking dignitaries in the face as they swung their legs over the backs of the seats.

Michael Buerk presented the traditional post-contest news bulletin. Russia was blocking Lithuania’s gas supply and moving tanks around in Vilnius while maintaining that nothing suspicious was going on (apart from a revolution, as we all know now), East and West Germany were uniting (and several of the Eurovision songs alluded to this) and while Bath played rugby at Twickenham, football supporters were rioting in Bournemouth.