My magnetic personality

The day started badly for Jof at 3 in the morning when the students next door woke her up with their noise. I guess when you're a first-year student in a new town with people you don't know then beer-talking loudly in the garden at 0300 is par for the course, as you strive to re-invent yourself as someone interesting. Didn't help Jofs' sleep, though.

After breakfast it was time to perform the magnet experiment. This has been a long time in the planning stages and yesterday we installed a series of magnet pairs on my army greatcoat and some sturdy jeans (venom wearing denim) and kept the sleeves separate using a broomstick, more recently used as a bonfire prodder.

I put on the magnetic trousers and stumped oddly down the street, like an old sailor man who has had too many friends. Bud carried the jacket-on-a-broomstick and Jof tried to pretend she wasn't with us.

Once we'd waddled down the secret passageway alongside the football ground, we got to the carpark where we saw it was full - they do a car boot sale every Sunday. This was an unexpected setback as really we wanted to do this unseen - but we pressed on anyway. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Ben drove up to us and they all laughed. They'd sold off another lot of junk and got £29 each, Ben had promptly spent some of his loot on a fierce plastic man in a cape, derivation unknown.

Question. How many neodymium alloy computer hard drive magnets does it take to securely stick a small child to a lorry? Answer: 18

In the corner of the car park was our target: 3 steel shipping containers by the generator. It was fenced off, so we removed the fence and I put the magnetised jacket on, and he removed the broomstick. I am now a style guru, pioneering the magnetic look. A security guard ambled over and assumed I was having a wee but then he looked bemused as Bud lifted me up and attached me to the steel wall with a series of bangs as all the magnets engaged. OK, so the posture could be improved, but the theory is good and the experiment was a success. Nobody else does this kind of stuff, life is fun if you laugh at it. We could definitely have used fewer magnets - I'm not exactly heavy. Sadly, as he struggled to remove me, 2 trouser-magnet pairs attracted and pinched some skin on the back of my leg which was V painful. There is a fix for this.

At some point in the future we will require Bud and some of my PuddleFriends for the next stage of this ongoing spectacle, based on this but much more spectacular, O for the chance to do it properly.

Later Jof took me to Marks and Spencer for a toastie sandwich. I had to pay for this by trailing around the shop looking at jumpers and shoes and other pointless items but that's life. At least I got 2 bath fizzers and some blackcurrant-scented body scrub jelly.

Meanwhile he ran again to make up for yesterday's slow one. Then I obtained Pops to play in Box #8, (see "Cardboard: Joy of Box" link on the right hand side) her beauty only slightly marred by a missing tooth. Then Baby Edward got in with us and made it to the top, he loved it too.

We took Jof to Mozzarella Joe's on the seafront for her birthday dinner, for she is even older tomorrow. We threw rocks into the sea before and after the meal, of all the foreign delights I could have had, I chose chicken nuggets. We all had pudding and were stuffed. It got dark while we were in there, all the lights looked very pretty and you could see the [flashing indicator lights associated with the] car alarms going off on the Wightlink ferry. We should come down here again for Buds' or my birthday - it'll be pitch black by 5pm so the lightshow should be even better.