Along with most of my friends, I'm at the stage of life where signs of incipient mortality, the frayed threads on the carpet as it were, are starting to nip at our heels. Those outliers of decay: uncomfortable blood pressure, bunions, aches and wounds that take longer and longer to heal; there are things to endure, conditions, worries, anxieties.

I'm feeling all of them today, apart from the bunions. At least that's a solace.

Ah....the England question...at some point I have to answer that. And today might as well be the day.

Let me start with this first: I am reluctantly proud to say that I have n't watched a single kick of England's inglorious passage through the World Cup except for the slew of unavoidable re-runs of the goal against tiny Slovenia

Supporting England is being the unwilling partner in a dysfunctional relationship, with you the bewildered, unhappy supporter endures season after season of betrayal, mind-games, infidelities, narcissism, and pure rudeness. And every time, you excuse them, welcome them home and try to start over again. The one last chance.

Well, I said no to that years ago; enough is enough. England, we're finished. No more taking you back. No more simply putting up with inevitable disappointment. There's nothing else the marriage guidance people can do. Our soccer affair is over. Which is how it's been for nearly twenty years.

Sad, because I would like them to perform, properly and successfully, but until they flush out the narcissists., illiterates, egomaniacs, and general self-absorbed navel gazers, I'm not going back to them.

Furthermore, there's something else that needs to be excised, which is this: England must purge itself of this 1966 fetish. A huge psychological burden and they've been labouring under it for 44 years already. What a Calvary. When do we look forward? We're intimidated by our global football history, not inspired by it.

Baked like a Brie today. Hot weather, skirting the upper twenties which is passing for tropical here in London; hot temper, through missing a train to Doncaster by a single minute for the second month running.

Missing the first was not an accident, nor should the second be seen as a spreading pattern of my incompetence; nope, it's the unseen web of weekend engineering works with the ever-present inability of Central Line trains to stick to a timetable.

Thursday 24 June was the fifth anniversary of my blogging career. I've surprised myself.

I'm not alone...there's someone else who's found out they're wearing a Harry Potter style invisibility cloak . Companionship, finally.

Blogging always takes a back seat during the summer. It's my need to wring as much as I can out of the fine, balmy air, enjoy the leafy cool of Holland Park, and simply relax.

Today in particular, I wanted to capitalise and extend the sense of contentment I've revelled in this weekend: three glorious days in Shrewsbury, with two delicious side trips into magical Mid-Wales. Viva Aberstywth !

The Under Offer board that's stuck outside the block of flats next to mine has been there for so long, it's fused into the surroundings so completely that unless I decide I want to see it, I do n't. It's the visual equivalent of background noise.

But I did just a few minutes ago, and it's fortitude - look it's out there in all weathers, sun-bleached and wind battered like an old Pub sign - struck me hard.

I need, I really, really do, a strong dose of the same patience and simple sang-froid that board's displaying when I pull the covers back on what passes as my pay rise. Small enough that it's questionable if it's visible to the naked eye. And I don't feel happy, no not one jot.

Yanks 1, Planks 1. The usual defeat snatched from the jaws of victory routine that England excels at.

The world is turned on it's head.

Things that should n't be happening are. Not talking 2012 Maya predictions or making a millennial doomsday reference, no birds falling from the skies and ruptures appearing in the time space continuum.

No, what's prompted me to open this way was finding out to my amazement that someone I knew has high blood pressure, and he's not even thirty.

Then, to compound that, I find out that someone else I'm friendly with, who's a scant few years older than him is also on blood pressure medication.

The rhetorician in me is fighting the urge to say something on the "surely this is out of kilter with what normally occurs in human chronology"; after all high blood pressure is something I've really only associated with people in my age range - late forties and onwards - not in people who are still comparatively wet behind the ears and nappy fresh.

This must be the effects of lifestyle. The coincidence is too much to argue otherwise

It's like the evidence for climate change; it's there, it's evident, and it's inescapable. But why? Don't people want to feel healthy for as long as they can?

I can add another item in the Summer's here list that already includes spiralling barbecue smoke, occasional and almost uncontrollable bouts of hay fever, sandals and maxi dresses. The new one? Combat trousers, semi and full length. There were so many men wearing them, including me, that West London looked as if it had been taken over by paramilitaries.

And how could I omit the stalwart of any such list. Volcanic downpours. Just about to hear one kick off where I'm writing these words. First gust of driving rain against the windows already.

Reading Paul Auster always leaves me feeling curiously disengaged from life. Why is that ?

It's been one of those days when I've wanted to be at the controls of a wrecking ball and not a laptop. Lots of irritations all day long. Temper up; patience down... way down