I know all the words to lots of songs. I sing along to songs a lot. Mainly in my car, but sometimes around the house. I’m not very good at singing but, like 90% of X Factor auditionees, this doesn’t stop me.

Of them all, PJ Harvey’s ‘Good Fortune’ is my very favourite singalong song. It is three and a half minutes of pure, unbridled joy and celebration of being in love. Plus, it allows me to practically yodel at the top of my voice. And just look at the video! Isn’t Polly Jean blimmin’ gorgeous?!

(I have not added the link to the official video on youtube because they’ve managed to upload it with the wrong aspect ratio. Idiots.)

My fascination with the process of bookbinding came much later, during a short break in Dublin. As we walked through the dimmed rooms of Trinity College’s visitor exhibition, towards the Book of Kells, I was drawn more and more to the engineering of this famous manuscript. Strange to think, it had never struck me before that this craft has had such influence over me throughout my life. A few days later, we visited the Chester Beatty Library and I was, once again, drawn to the collection of bindings. I was hooked.

So, it has been in the back of mind for some time to try my hand at bookbinding. Sadly, it is not the kind of evening class you find at every local college and, besides, I’ve been occupied by much less creative study in recent years. This year, though, I was determined to get my hands on a ticket to one of the three hour courses run each year at the Cheltenham Literature Festival.

I am not naturally “crafty” and my artistic skills have always left a great deal to be desired. But after three hours with Cheltenham based bookbinder and book conservator, Sue Crossley, I came away with a beautiful hand bound notebook, an overwhelming sense of achievement and an even fiercer fascination with bookbinding than I’d had before.

The following day, I booked a full day workshop at Sue’s Cheltenham studio: a former bookshop, appropriately. “Bring lunch,” she told me on the phone, “and bring an extra Mars bar. It’ll be a long, hard day.” She was right, but it was also a wonderful day. We arrived at 9am – four bookbinding novices – and got to work, observing Sue as she took us through each step to create our own journals in the limp vellum style, and described the history of the craft, and then throwing ourselves in to it. Sue uses high quality materials for her books: super soft, natural grained goatskin and heavy 140gsm cotton rag mould-made paper. We stroked each, cooing over them.

The cutting and folding of the paper, the stitching of the pages and the head and end bands, the marking out and punching of holes in the leather: it was almost meditative. The stitching of the headband, in particular, took considerable patience and acute concentration. And whilst I look at it now and notice its imperfections, it is my favourite element of the finished book, the greatest part of my achievement.

At 5.30pm, I left the studio, delighted with the final book. Back aching, thumb sore, eyes crossed, but delighted.

Aren’t they beautiful? (The green book was made at the Literature Festival, the terracotta book during the full day workshop.) Now… What should go in them…?!

For more information about Sue Crossley’s bookbinding workshops (which I highly recommend!), visit – http://www.thegreenwoodgallery.co.uk/index.html

I’m not what you’d call an expert on dating. I’ve been with my husband for nearly ten years, having been friends beforehand, and was in an 18 month relationship immediately (ahem) before that. I’ve only been asked on one date (during sixth form) and I stood him up because my friend Gem phoned whilst I was on the bus to Southampton to meet my date and invited me to join her at Jumpin’ Jaks which, in my book back then, inexplicably and rather embarrassingly took precedence. All of this may explain why nobody else has ever asked me on a date.

Not being an expect, I’ve learnt rather a lot. Ladies, take note… (I should clarify that I’m not picking on girls. I just haven’t looked at any male profiles – again, no, really – so can’t comment on them.)

1. Internet dating is quite stressful and also a little bit soul destroying. There are a lot of girls out there. Some might be awesome. Some might not be awesome. All I know – and this may be difficult for some male readers to believe – is that I have a threshold when it comes to looking a photos of girls and this week, I’ve gone well beyond that threshold. On a more serious note, this has put a new perspective on my friend’s relationship with internet dating. I know he’s found it tough at times, that it’s difficult to see the wood for the trees and that there’s an unwritten etiquette that can result in all kinds of anxieties. I also know that his current open-minded attitude towards it – to take a chance and see how it goes – is the best approach and that, to be honest, more of the girls on MSF could take a leaf out of his book.
2. It’s really, really hard to get the photo right. I can relate to this one. What single photo makes you look: a) hot, b) the kind of girl a guy would take home to his mum, c) serious/intelligent,  d) fun/spontaneous, e) etc. on the internet? What I’ve learnt from MSF is that most girls go for a), with a few opting for d). I can’t blame them for that but my feedback would be that – without exception – I have found the nicest, most appealing photos of girls in their secondary gallery. These are usually photos of the girl taken during the daytime, wearing a little makeup and ALWAYS smiling. Not pouting, MySpace style. Or doing a wacky face. Smiling. There are plenty of very, very pretty ladies on MSF but you could be easily led to think there aren’t.
3. Against Her Better Judgement makes this point far more succinctly than I, but some users and/or their friends appear to put very little effort in to their profiles and you kind of wonder whether they really want to stand out from the crowd. I came across very few profiles that don’t describe the lady in question as loyal, generous, gorgeous, funny, intelligent, etc. and little else. These are all lovely qualities that I guess you’d hope to find in a girlfriend but they’re so overused, they tell you very little about what makes a person tick. The interesting profiles are those that are creative (although not with the truth, obviously).
4. The vast majority of girls appear to be teachers, doctors or solicitors who have just got back from Cambodia. I have no idea what the significance of this is but it’s a strange thing.

Such as Scandinavian interior design store, Hus & Hem, which is bright, clean and everything Ikea wishes it could be. And it sells these, very cool trophy deer heads:

Further down a cobbled alley, we stumbled across the wholly-unexpected Tinsmiths building (which Jonathan Glancey talks about here):

(Image from: http://davidnice.blogspot.com/2008_08_01_archive.html)

However, what Ledbury lacks is a selection of restaurants willing to serve customers between 5pm and 6pm. Just when Leigh and I needed to eat. Cue a dash to visit Leigh’s partner’s mum, who knocked together a delicious home-cooked meal in her beautiful kitchen, overlooking the Herefordshire countryside. Wonderful.

Fed and watered, we ventured back to the town centre and to the Burgage Hall for our first event: Stuart Maconie’s Poetry Playlist. A Desert Island Discs affair, Maconie talked about his love of poetry and picked ten of his favourite poems, reading them from his iPad (or, where technology let him down, a fail-safe piece of paper). His choices ranged from familiar classics – such as Keats’s ‘An Ode to Autumn’ (which I had to recite at school, I can still do so) – to poems I’ve never heard of but thoroughly enjoyed. I am very pleased to have discovered Billy Collins’s ‘Man In Space’ – the best poem about feminism I ever heard (and by a man!). Maconie was witty and engaging; his description of Philip Larkin as poetry’s Morrissey was absolutely spot on and his unashamed love of poetry was evident.

After a quick half of Wye Valley Brewery’s HPA in the Prince of Wales (hurrah!), we were joined by Hilary for readings by Ann Caldwell and Costa winner Jo Shapcott. Caldwell’s sequence of eight poems – The Underwater House – reminded me of Ali Shaw’s strange fairy tale, ‘The Girl With The Glass Feet’, and of the maritime storytelling of Jeanette Winterson’s ‘Lighthousekeeping’. Both particular favourites of mine.

Our last event was the Jamaican dub poet, Jean ‘Binta’ Breeze, who we’d spotted earlier whiling away the July afternoon on a shabby sofa outside the Prince of Wales, cigarette and wine in hand. Breeze was an absolute blast. She read and sang her poems of history and heritage and lust and loss and the audience lapped it up. Her poem ‘The Flag’ moved me to tears and she had me singing along by the end.

All in all, a lovely day. Here’s Simon Armitage reading ‘The Christening’ (from 2:29) – one of Maconie’s Top Ten – to make you smile and also frown a little bit in confusion.

“Stuff comes blurting out.”

Whilst we’re here, I’m well aware I haven’t completed the 30 day music challenge. I’m not much of a completer-finisher. Let’s call it a hiatus and I’ll finish it some other time.

The less that is said about Sucker Punch the better.  There are moments of sheer visual brilliance: the scene in the snow with the awesome ‘Army of Me’ by Bjork and the steampunk/zombie Nazi scene looked stunning.  But, ultimately, it’s like watching someone play a really good video game. There is no storyline to speak of, nobody even tries to act (Emily Browning looks hot but does nothing beyond pouting) and I got a bit bored towards the end.

(I wrote more about Sucker Punch than I’d planned.)

TT3D – a film about the annual road race on the Isle of Man and the people who race, manage, marshal and love it – is another thing altogether. When I was a kid, my mum and step-dad went off to the Isle of Man each year, their tent strapped to the back of their GSX-R. A couple of years, they marshalled. My house was adorned with framed photos of TT hero, Joey Dunlop. I’ve never been, but it’s on the list.

The film itself is wonderful. At times, genuinely funny – Guy Martin’s comment on Barry Sheen finding the race too dangerous got a huge laugh – the film doesn’t flinch from the loss that inevitably goes along with racing round the winding roads of the Isle of Man at breakneck speeds. I laughed, I cried and I loved every minute of it.

Guy Martin – the potty-mouthed, masturbation-fixated eccentric and enfant terrible of the TT world – steals the show. It’s easy to see why the film-makers focus on him but it’s a shame that, with the audience rooting for Guy, he sometimes overshadows the sheer achievement of other racers, including the quietly determined Ian Hutchinson. Still, he is hugely entertaining and the film would lose a certain something without him.

Whether or not the film would lose anything if it weren’t in 3D is a tough question. I’ve blogged before about how little I like 3D, but TT3D *almost* pulls it off.  The whole film is so beautifully, cleanly shot – particularly the climactic Senior race – and, when the 3D effect is used subtly, it works really well.  From time to time, though, it felt a little gimmicky and I’m still not sold.

Despite that, it’s a film I’d highly recommend. If you’re a bike fan, the footage of the racing is stunning and the insight in to the race preparations is fascinating. If you’ve never watched a bike race in your life, it is funny, exciting and moving enough to keep you engaged throughout.

People applauded at the end. I’m not kidding.

Pulp’s F.E.E.L.I.N.G.C.A.L.L.E.D.L.O.V.E. (which is quite difficult to type) reminds me of my first Reading Festival, in 2000. Pulp headlined Saturday night and this song, probably my favourite Pulp song, brings with it distinct memories of being exhausted, drunk, muddy, wet and happy. We were standing next to a man with a badger of the end of a stick and a bunch of people burning plastic on a bonfire, which gave me a headache. I can remember it like it was yesterday.

The first time I visited my dad in New Zealand in 2002, Robbie Williams’s Feel had just been released there and we listened to it in his car a lot. It reminds me of driving round the Otago Harbour road – right alongside the shore – to Dunedin from his old house in Portobello (not only do you get the song but also a photo – just so you can really get as close to the experience as possible, you lucky things). I’m not the world’s biggest Robbie Williams fan but the memory is a very happy one.

When I Argue I See Shapes by Idlewild reminds me of her. She used to drive me to sixth form college in Eastleigh and we’d smoke and listen to tapes and I’d inflict on her stories of my disastrous love life. We listened to this song a lot – and we’d take it in turns to sing the bits at the end.

N.B. There’s some runners up for this category – Shimmy Shimmy Ya by Ol’ Dirty Bastard reminds me of my good friend TJ and the time he put a lot of effort into getting me to like hip hop, Song for Clay (Disappear Here) by Bloc Party reminds me of Omar and a gazillion songs remind me of my husband…

Holby City went through a phase of playing it over all their sad storylines and it made me cry a lot (not entirely surprising, if you know me). Now Sky Atlantic and Dustin Hoffman are ruining it all over again.