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Thursday 1 December 
Time to crack open the Cats Protection Advent calendar, which they sent to members for free and described as "an inexpensive gift." I love them. Name of cat inside door one: Simba. (This picture isn't Simba, by the way, it's Eric, but I found him on the Cats Protection website gallery) A good and a bad start to Advent, especially in light of the calendar. One of the cats, Pepper, killed a bird. I can hardly bring myself to type it . . . she killed a robin. Probably the same robin that I saw through the patio door while exercising first thing this morning. The next time I saw it, it was on the landing, bereft of life. I said I wanted a robin in my hand, but not this way, not dead, and not with my hand in a makeshift Waitrose-bag glove. The good bit: xfm premiered Arctic Monkeys' new single, When The Sun Goes Down, which fans have had in demo form for months, but this is the first taste of what will be the official album version and to the band's great and unsurprising credit, they've not ruined it. It's weird, if you know the song like the back of your hand, to hear the line, "You must be f----ing freezing" with the offending word swallowed up by self-censorship, but hey, if it's to get to number one, it needs airplay. Actually, no it doesn't. It'll get to number one anyway. (I can't remember the last time I gathered round the radio to hear the first play of anything. The rejuvenation continues.)

Met up with an old college friend Dave Keech for food and drink tonight. It's been eight years since I last saw him, on his wedding day, in fact. Since which, he and his wife moved out to live in Japan , where he worked as a designer for Yamaha. They started a family and have recently moved back to England . It was tremendous to see him. We met in 1983 on the Foundation Art course at Nene College in Northampton (he's a Kettering lad, which is the next town along). He and I hit it off immediately and he got me into jazz - he's a handy trombonist and still plays. Because he's also a bird lover (man and boy in fact, far better than me at identifying birds), we have much in common. More, in fact, than our shared college past. Indeed, though we talked all night, we spent very little of it raking over the past, which can often be the case when you meet old acquaintances and it stunts the conversation. We have promised ourselves a birdwatching expedition, perhaps to a reservoir or marsh, and I must make it a New Year's Resolution.

Passed a queue of people outside the self-explanatory shop called Game on Oxford Street as we walked to the tube station at about 10pm, they were keen to get hold of an Xbox 360, the new games console from Microsoft, when the shop opened at midnight. It's been widely reported that there aren't enough of these boxes to meet demand. In other words, there are, but they're keeping a load back in order to create a panic among men with elasticated waistbands and body odour. You'll all get one, don't worry. But not until it's been all over the media.

Friday 2 December 
Name of cat inside door two of Cats Protection Advent calendar: Sonny. Trip up to Northampton to see Mum and Dad for lunch. I treated Dad to an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm - his first - as I suspected it might tickle him and I was right. (We watched The Interior Decorator from season one; it made me want to start watching them all again from the start.) A pleasant visit, with some lamb in it. Having spent much of Wednesday on the M25 on the voyage to Alexandra Palace, it was unfortunate to have mistimed the return journey and end up spending another two hours on it tonight in crawling traffic, dreaming of doing anything above 10mph. But you won't catch me complaining. Not in this blog.

Saturday 3 December 
Name of cat inside door of Cats Protection Advent calendar: Paddy. This, of course, isn't a cat, but well-known endangered bear, the panda. She's Yan Yan, the unfortunately infertile mate of Bao Bao, and Leona took this picture of her at Berlin Zoo last weekend. She feels the same way about zoos as I do, but loves pandas and was drawn to pay her respects. I once did this with a killer whale at a wildlife park in San Diego in 1994. I have been obsessed with Orcas since childhood and used to have recurring dreams about them, so I felt the need to commune with one. Unfortunately it was one who lived in a pool. I had my photograph taken sitting next to the viewing window of its pool and experienced shivers down my spine in awe and respect of this great beast as it swam past, mere feet from my face, but I knew, deep down, that it shouldn't be living in a pool. I disapprove of zoos in my bones, despite the conservation aspect that now underpins their work.

So, back to work. (Sometimes I love working at weekends, sometimes I don't, although I had quite a nice Saturday morning watching Popworld on Channel 4 and the start of CD:UK on ITV, which is what normal people do.) When I got on my train from Redhill, it was much fuller than normal, so I was forced to sit next to a man. He had been reading the Guardian and all of its myriad useless Saturday sections, and, when he'd finished with each one, he had roughly shoved them behind the folding table of the empty seat next to him, as if perhaps by doing so, the screwed-up Family and Jobs and Review and Sport sections would disappear, along with the Guide and the Saturday magazine. Instead, they just stuck out, looking untidy, like a newsprint nest, as if perhaps a miniature tramp was sleeping behind the folding table. When I sat next to him (and I knew they were his, by the way, as he had kept back one section, which sat in his lap, like a smoking gun), I asked if they were his and he replied, with a weary sigh, that yes I could have them. I took great pleasure in confounding his expectations by saying, "No, I want to get rid of them."

At which I took them and put them in the bin. I don't know why I found this act so satisfying, but I did. I sat back down and read my compact, one-section New Statesman, which is more left wing than his Guardian. This made me feel even smugger. (If he hadn't used the sighing tone of voice on me, I would have treated the man as a kindred spirit. After all, it's rare to get a Guardian reader on this train, they all read the Times and the Mail and the Telegraph, but then they are mostly people who live on the South coast, where all the foreign immigrants come in on rafts made from banana crates, and I expect they feel the need to keep their guard up at all times.)

My cab driver from the station tonight had tinsel draped all round the inside of his cab, plus baubles hanging from the roof, which rattled around, especially when he drove over speed bumps, of which there are many on the way home. You have to admire his Christmas spirit. He looked quite hard as well.

Sunday 4 December
Name of cat inside door of Cats Protection Advent calendar: Peggy Paws. (Daft name, lovely cat.) Among the news stories Richard Herring and I made light of today on the show were George Best's Diana-style funeral, Moors murderer Ian Brady cheating on his hunger strike by eating Cadbury's Creme Eggs and a moral dilemma for the Queen: Prince Williams and his girlfriend Kate Middleton, both 23, will be sleeping under her roof at Sandringham this Christmas but should she let them share a room? (They will, of course, have sex anyway, whether she does or not - it's a massive house, so it won't be too hard to sneak off somewhere quiet. It's lucky that, as the male heir, he doesn't have to be a virgin when he gets married like his prospective bride does, according to royal law. He obviously has no plans to marry this girl Kate Middleton then, or at least if he ever did, he's likely to have disqualified her with his young lust. That's nice, isn't it?)

Watched two Seinfields from season three ( The Dog, The Library) and tried to follow them with an episode of The West Wing but fell asleep while Kate Harper was talking to a former CIA colleague about Castro's health. So I gave up and turned in, thus missing Man Stroke Woman. I keep missing things that I really want to see. For instance, I haven't seen one single episode of Broken News, and I really want to see that.

Monday 5 December
Watched half an episode of Broken News tonight. It wasn't very good - a really tired old subject, not done in an especially new way, and I speak as an ardent admirer of its creator John Morton. That'll show me. I'd be even sadder if I was watching E.T. and I soon will be. Name of cat inside door of Advent calendar: Rocky, a nice black and white. Creeping freelance panic. I have now officially got too many things to write in too little time - my Telly Addict column by tomorrow, the Ronnie Barker review by Wednesday, the Arctic Monkeys piece by Friday, and the sitcom by . . . now! I did bits to all four before lunch, then went to Kingston to see The Constant Gardener, which at least alleviated the stress of not knowing which thing to write. Beautifully directed by the City Of God bloke (I will look up his name), this African-set diplomatic thriller with Ralph Fiennes and Rachel Weisz was two hours and ten minutes long, which made it officially 20 minutes too long. I think I could identify which bits needed cutting as I watched it. But an intelligent film, well acted, with a superb false pregnant belly on Ms Weisz, and any film that casts the pharmaceutical industry as the villain is alright by me, although my views are not necessarily those of the BBC, or the NHS, or the government etc. Tonight, finally caught up with The Worst Week Of My Life from Friday night. It continues to entertain.

Carol Thatcher, a seemingly objectionable woman, won I'm A Celebrity. I haven't watched it this time around, not through any moral objection (of the reality shows, it's the one I've seen most of over the last couple of years), but because I knew I didn't have the time to watch it, and it's vastly improved by continued, loyal viewing. In fact, of all five series, I've only really missed this one and the Phil Tufnel one. I enjoyed the other three very much.

Tuesday 6 December
Name of today's cat: Billy, a tabby. A hugely productive day's writing at home, which began with a good 45-minute workout. This means I have less to write about here, so that will be a blessed relief for you. I finished my Telly Addict column for Word , followed by my Ronnie Barker piece, for which I watched further bits from the 12-disc Ultimate Ronnie Barker Collection , priced £99.99 (don't get excited, they haven't sent me the whole thing, just unmarked check-discs, as they're called, of Clarence, The Magnificent Evans, Open All Hours and Seven Of One).

Also managed to write a letter of objection to Reigate & Banstead Council about the latest amendments to the planning application to convert a nearby house into a block of ten flats. I'm getting good at that. And I listened for the first time to the Kate Bush album Aerial, which I enjoyed, despite the mediaeval sounding track on the first of its two albums. You might think that Kate Bush's record company would send me a free copy of her album because I am a DJ working for the BBC, but no, so I punished them by going out and buying it. That'll show them. Also saw a woodpecker. And ate a leg of lamb with the first Jerusalem artichokes of the season. Not a bad day. Last Property Ladder of this run, and a repeat judging by Sarah's hair, which was permed at one point, in which two twins from Lichfield proved to be quite the least appealing first-time property developers ever: bickering, going over-budget, going over-schedule, prevaricating, changing their minds, ignoring Sarah's sage advice, doing stuff themselves that they were unqualified to do, my God it was a miserable experience.

Finished watching the West Wing I nodded off during last night, episode 19, Ninety Miles Away by John Sacret Young, all about Cuba. I loved the flashback to 1995 in which we saw Kate in a wig and Leo all boozed off his face.

David Cameron, who is related to the Queen, won the Tory leadership contest, by a mile. (The Tories don't want someone who was born on a council estate, deep down, do they?) This is the second significant Conservative victory of the week, after Carol Thatcher's. I suspect today's will have more impact on my life, in the future.

Wednesday 7 December 
Today's Advent cat: Lucky, a white cat. It gives me great pleasure to open the doors on the Advent calendar. I don't know why. Finding the Christmas spirit is not easy. They really go for it with the American-style Christmas lights and reindeer-on-the-roof around certain parts of suburban Surrey , such as Morden, and there's already a house that's covered in them in Rose Hill. Though the sight of twinkling coloured lights is undeniably Christmassy, I can't help but think it's a bit beat-your-neighbour, like wearing coloured armbands and ribbons to prove how much you care, when simply caring ought to be enough. I have no wish to be a Scrooge about it, but since we are threatened with a harsh winter and power shortages and old people dying of hypothermia, perhaps cutting back on our electricity usage would be more in the spirit of the season. Also, we've allowed America to take over Hallowe'en, can't we keep Christmas British?

They're not even allowed to say "Happy Christmas!" over there, in the land of the free. They have capital punishment in 38 states, but you mustn't utter the wrong festive greeting. (You see, I'm not being a Scrooge - I think we should all wish each other a Happy Christmas! Just not yet. It's 7 December.) Bought some Christmas cards. Although this involved battling through the crowds on Oxford Street , it did pique my festive glands.

Thursday 8 December
I don't want to make a big song and dance about it, but I'm going to rest the blog for a while. The sitcom and the book must take precedence. The sitcom has to be written by May, the book by February, and if I'm to meet those deadlines I must knuckle down, something you will know from reading about my day-to-day life for the last 36 weeks I do all too rarely. It's already a punishing workload, plus extra writing for Word and Radio Times, and the distraction of two Radio 4 series to record over December and January. So something has to give. It's been a blast. Thank you for reading. I'll be back.