Half a foot of snow today so the entire nation shuts down. I decide to join the day of enforced rest, despite the fact that I work from home. An air of wartime-cameraderie-meets-Christmas atmosphere is pervading the neighbourhood and I want a piece of it. The elements have spoken and the corporate machine falls as mute as the soft white snow outside our window. Except for Jax, who is finally confronted by the one negative aspect of living opposite her workplace and trudges sullenly across the road while the rest of London whoops and cheers in a ‘school’s out’ fashion.

I wave her off in my dressing gown and decide to take the day for myself. I realise that, off the back of a weekend and not really working in the first place this could seem indulgent, but I figure when I have children I’m going to spend at least 10 straight years thinking and doing for others, so I give myself a break. My plan is a day of personal productivity, a reduction of the perennial to-do list that saunters around the back of my head. First of all though, a shower. I have the shower, and discover a pot of rose and mint organic face mask in the bathroom cupboard. The pot asks me if I have stressed out skin. I do, I reply. And, it asks, do I expose my skin to free radicals such as pollution, cigarette smoke and the general wear and tear of city living? I do, I reply. Well then, the pot tells me, you’d better slap a thick layer of this on and lie down for ten minutes otherwise the impurities in your skin will fester and breed and you’ll look like ET by the time you’re 35. I do as instructed and stretch out on the new sofa. I flick on the new TV to pass the time and discover that ITV3, oh glorious channel that it is, is playing an early Nineties feature-length Poirot. And it’s just started.

I wake up two hours later to discover that the rose and mint has dried into a curd on my face. I have effectively sealed free radicals into my pores. I panic. My left cheek is bare, and I realise that a large lump of the curd is now smeared across the new sofa. I wash my face and notice a blackhead on my nose. I heat the kettle. I pour the boiling water into the sink and steam my face. Dizzy from sleep and the home made sauna, I squeeze at my face until the dot of black, followed by a small worm of yellow jumps out of my skin. It feels good. I carry on until the water in the basin is cold and my face is a series of red lumps. It doesn’t feel so good. It looks terrible. I re-heat the kettle and spend the next twenty minutes trying to wash and grind the curd out of the sofa. I give up and put a cushion over the offending patch.
I make a cup of tea and think about writing a to-do list. Instead I think about the Incredibly Fit, Slightly Older man that I met the previous night at Jax’s work drinks. He was hot, I was hysterically funny and suitably coquettish. I wonder if he’ll ask Jax for my number. I text Jax and ask her if he’s asked for my number. She texts back no. I sip my tea and re-enact the conversation in my head. He seemed keen. Maybe he has a girlfriend. He didn’t act like he had a girlfriend. Maybe he’s a womanizer. He didn’t seem like a womanizer. I text Jax to ask if she thinks he’s a womanizer. She texts back no. I'm now convinced he is a womanizer and text Jax to instruct her not to give him my number if he asks for it. I have a look in the fridge and find half a banana , a Kit Kat and two bottles of white wine. I eat the banana and the Kit Kat. I decide to look up the Incredibly Fit, Slightly Older Womanizer on the internet. Jax doesn’t believe in Facebook but Marky does and he’s got about 800 friends so the Womanizer is bound to be one of them. Bingo. There’s a whole album from a company cycling trip in France that summer. He is Incredibly Fit. I text Jax and tell her that she can give out my number if he asks for it. She texts back to say that she and the Arty Alpha were the only ones who made it into work and have spent the past half hour snogging on her desk.
I go for a wee. I notice that the bikini waxer missed two hairs and that they are waving about like flags in a storm. I spend twenty minutes looking for the scissors with no luck. I can’t pull them out. I stare at them for a while. I search for the scissors a bit more and give up. It is now 4pm and I haven’t even written the to-do list yet. I glance out of the window and see the children of Shoreditch having a snowball fight. Then I realise they are throwing snowballs at cars and passers-by. Then I realise that they are not snowballs at all, but parcels of dog shit from the curb covered in snow. They are playing Turdball. There seems to be an older kid as leader, the youngest one is the poo-collector (he has plastic bags tied on over his gloves), a couple of girls prepare the balls and the fat one with the good arm takes aim and lobs them at the unwitting public. It’s pretty funny actually. I’m quite impressed with the ingenuity. I wonder if Turdball could be Britain’s new sport in the 2012 Olympics - it is demonstrative of the East London youth community after all.

I start the to-do list. I have to get some more light bulbs, pay my National Insurance, put a wash on, call the Council about removing building waste from the flat, call my bank about switching my contents insurance. I give up, the boringness outweighs the productiveness tenfold. Instead I think about what animals all of my friends look like. Jax would be a rat, for example. Lots of people look like bears, and I can think of one who would be a rhino. I decide it’s best not to tell them that. I think about cleaning the bathroom and decide not to. Instead I spend a fruitful twenty minutes reading the TV guide and scraping dirt from under my nails. I decide to make some fairy cakes but then realise we have no flour. It’s too snowy to go to the corner shop.

Jax texts me and says the Incredibly Fit, Slightly Older Possible Womanizer texted her to ask for my number, which she gave him. I make sure my phone is charged and on and wander around it for a while. It’s still snowing. Jegs appears in the street wearing a dayglo 1980s one-piece ski suit. The kids go to throw a turdball at him, but he’s way ahead of them and threatens to chop off their hands if they do. He looks pretty scary in the one-piece and the kids turn their attention to the postal van skidding down the road.

I go into the art trunk with the aim of creating a collage and find the missing scissors. I go into the bathroom and lop off the two offending hairs, it is a relief. My phone beeps. It is the Womanizer with a quip about the snow and an invitation for drinks in Primrose Hill the following evening. The suggestion of waywardly caddish, old-school-cool Primrose Hill grabs my attention. I reply in the affirmative. Bikini line trimmed and date secured I am feeling terribly productive. Jax comes home, glowing and giggling from a day of office heavy petting. ITV3 are showing a repeat of the earlier Poirot so we take one of the bottles of white from the fridge and settle down with David Suchet, surely the coolest cad of them all.