My new chair - I have already fallen asleep reading in it

I confess I have converging deadlines this week - the magazine I edit plus a corporate book project plus some website text work. And I have a head cold. Ohhh boo hoo! So I dream of sitting in my new chair, bought from the most camp furniture dealer in Melbourne, sipping something tasty and, of course, writing my blog. None of the above will be happening.

I will say that, inspired by listening to him speak on a podcast I downloaded recently, I put down People of the Book and picked up Lisey's Story by Stephen King. Bad move. I have made yet another dire discovery about getting older. I cannot read creepy books before bed.

Let's just say, an hour after falling asleep I was dealing with a train station where, on a cold bleak night, trains kept coming and going but none of them were going to my destination and no one could tell me where to find mine. Then, in grassland near the tracks, I discovered a man's body, face down in the grass - looking pretty dead. Nearby stood a child wearing a hooded top. So small and isolated in the cold night. The child had its back turned from me.

I went over to it, realising it must have been the child of the dead man. I touched its shoulder. It turned around but its face was a wizened thing - white, chalky, somehow featureless. Arghhhh. I woke up with my hear thumping like it was going to burst through my PJs and, I tell you, it took an hour of reading Architectural Digest to calm me enough to sleep. Nigh night Stephen!

It was all very Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland in 'Don't Look Now'. Haven't seen the film? Take a peep at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpOL_tLvi7w