David Whitaker at 95

David Whitaker
in Australia, early 1970s

On 18 April 1928, 95 years ago today, David Arthur Whitaker was born in Knebworth.

In 1963, David became the first story editor of the new science-fiction series Doctor Who, and oversaw of 53 consecutive episodes. 

(Two of those weren't broadcast: the unbroadcast pilot was rewritten and re-rerecorded as the broadcast An Unearthly Child, and the two episodes Crisis and The Urge to Live were, after they'd been recorded, edited down into a single episode. I'm not counting the re-recording of The Dead Planet in this total because, so far as we know, the production team worked from the same script so it didn't need David's attention.)

(Also, David didn't receive credit on The Edge of Destruction or The Brink of Disaster because he was the credited writer on those. There's no story editor credited on The Powerful Enemy or Desperate Measures, either, and he may well have written these while still employed as story editor. But paperwork suggested his editorial duties concluded with the episode before that, Flashpoint, so that's where I'm stopping this count. Phew.)

David is also the credited writer on 40 episodes of Doctor Who - more than anyone else in the 1960s, the fourth most prolific TV writer of old-skool Doctor Who (after Robert Holmes on 64, Terry Nation on 56 and Malcolm Hulke on 45 if we count his co-written episodes as 0.5).

Of the 97 missing episodes of Doctor Who, David Whitaker was the credited writer on 18. (John Lucarotti was credited on 11, some co-written, Brian Hayles on 9, Ian Stuart Black on 8.)

David also wrote two of the first three Doctor Who novelisations, co-wrote two of the first three Dalek annuals, co-wrote the first Doctor Who related stage play, polished one of the two Dr. Who movies and probably wrote the bulk of the long running Daleks comic strip.

It's the 60th anniversary of Doctor Who this year, so where was David Whitaker on this day in 1963, his 35th birthday? Well, he was in (or just about to go to) New York in an effort to sell a musical he'd written, Model Girl, with composer George Posford.

Excerpt of letter from David Whitaker
to June Barry, 30 April 1963

Going round the various showbiz houses to schlep his play, he was introduced as, "David Whitaker who drinks sherry."

He returned to the UK around 14 May, presenting his fiancee June Barry with an antique phone, a gift for the flat they were in the process of agreeing to rent after their forthcoming wedding on 8 June.

June Barry in the
Daily Mirror, 3 August 1963

Yes, that's the same top (and same flat) as seen in a 1965 photo shoot of June and David conducted for TV World - the Birmingham-region version of TV Times.

David Whitaker and June Barry
at home, c. May 1965

Daily Mirror, 3 July 1963

(Doreen Spooner, the Daily Mirror's 'camera girl', who took the photo of June with the phone, had the previous month made front-page news with this extraordinary scoop, sneakily shot from the door of a pub toilet.)

David died in 1980 aged just 51. He was still working on Doctor Who. This form recently came to light, proof (at last!) that he'd been working on a novelisation of his 1967 TV serial The Evil of the Daleks.

I wrote a book about The Evil of the Daleks. Later this year, I've got a book out about another of David's Doctor Who stories, The Edge of Destruction.

You can learn more about David Whitaker in the documentary I worked on with splendid Chris Chapman and Toby Hadoke, on the Season 2 box-set released last year.

And I'm currently writing a ginormous biography, David Whitaker in an Exciting Adventure with Television, to be published by Ten Acre Films later this year. I'll end with this lovely note from David to a young Doctor Who fan in 1964...

Letter from David Whitaker
to Doctor Who fan Ian

Doctor Who Magazine 544

Doctor Who Magazine 544

It's 40 years - and six days - since the first issue of Doctor Who Weekly, which is now Doctor Who Magazine. Issue 544 celebrates this ridiculous milestone with all sorts of goodies, including - hooray! - and index of features and interviews that is really useful for a job I'm doing today.

Also in the issue is a short interview with me about my forthcoming Doctor Who audio story, The Home Guard.

The view from the top of the BT Tower

Portrait by Nimbos

Last night, Nimbos took me on an extra-special birthday treat - to the top of the BT Tower.

As part of the London Festival of Architecture, Tim Ross was doing a comedy set on the 34th floor, and as well as that we got a complimentary glass of fizz and the most extraordinary views as the outer part of the room slowly, slowly revolved.

Here are the pictures and videos I took:

Wheel turn

Yesterday, the Lord of Chaos and I took a turn on the London Eye to help his cousin celebrate her birthday. I'd not been on the Eye since my days of courting the Dr, back in the summer of 2000, and had forgotten how high it is, and how strange to be right over the river. His Lordship entirely loved it - "This was my best day ever," he squealed, unprompted. Here are some photos:

His Lordship and a cousin as the ride begins.

Hungerford Bridge - and Cleopatra's Needle.

The Royal Air Force Memorial with golden eagle on top.
The TARDIS lands the other side of it in Rose (2005).

Shell building, Waterloo station, building site, playground.

Best effort at Buckingham Palace, nestling in the greenery.

The office.

The office, landscape.

Afterwards, I was required to ride the carousel.

Briefly, we had a daughter

Early this morning, our eight day-old daughter died, peacefully and calmly, with me and the Dr holding on to her. What follows is mostly for friends in real life, as I've been struggling to manage updates.

The past few months have been exciting, terrifying and surreal, a strange dream from which we've now woken.

Having been shown rather definitively in 2010 that we couldn't have biological kids of our own, we'd moved on, created an identity as a barren couple, and adopted our beloved Lord of Chaos. So the pregnancy came as a complete surprise this spring. We assumed, given our history, that it simply wouldn't work and it was another complete surprise when the hospital rang to ask what we were playing at - as we'd crossed the first important milestones but hadn't booked any appointments or tests.

We were still dubious, and avoided saying anything online, preferring to tell people in person. (Then forgetting who we had and hadn't told, and making a bit of a meal of it. Sorry.)

But as we went to our appointments, all look just fine, and we allowed ourselves to believe it. The Lord of Chaos was relieved to be getting a sister because - he said - he wouldn't have to share so many toys. We bought things for baby and things were bequeathed. I took on loads of freelance jobs so I could afford some time off round the birth. We even worked out how we'd refer to our second child online: as "Minotaur". We looked forward to her arrival.

Then, last week, the Dr was rushed to hospital as - it turned out - her waters had broken eight weeks' early. Friends and grandparents moved at short notice to come to our assistance, looking after the Lord of Chaos and running errands while I dashed to the Dr's side. But the tests showed things were okay with Minotaur. She would just be arriving early - they hoped in 2-3 weeks.

Minotaur had other ideas about that and with very little notice arrived one morning last week. She was swooped on by doctors but everything looking fine. I watched Minotaur being carefully placed in an incubator - like all premature babies - and grinned at her funny monkey face as she blinked dolefully back at me. Much later, exhausted and relieved, I went home to Champagne with my delighted Dad, and began letting people know.

But 12 hours after being born, Minotaur took a sudden turn for the worse. We were told straight away that the prospects were not good. The Dr and Minotaur were rushed by ambulance, all lights blazing, to a specialist unit across town, but we were put under no illusion that things were very grave.

We expected her to die, but Minotaur held on tenaciously over the weekend. There were even small signs of improvement. We let ourselves hope that she would pull through.

But on Tuesday the results of a series of tests proved that Minotaur's condition was every bit as severe as first suggested. There would be no happy ending. And yet, even in that terrible moment there was still some joy: they released Minotaur from her incubator so we could at long last hold her.

I'm grateful to have held her, to have spent time with her away from the tubes and machines, and that at least some family were able to see her, too - and note her eyes and hair being her mother's, and her long skinny feet from me.

Last night, just the three of us had a room to ourselves and we spent the long hours talking, reading stories, clinging on. Minotaur gazed at us dolefully and held the Dr's finger, and knew that we were there. We poured out our hearts to her, and loved her. I think she knew that, too - and that's why she hung on so long. This morning she died.

We are in pieces. But we are grateful to have held her and for so many small moments with her. Friends and family have been incredible - even though there was so little that anyone could do. We're very grateful, too, to the staff at both Croydon University Hospital and St George's Hospital, who so diligently cared for us and our poor Minotaur, making her short life painless, peaceful and something we can cherish.

We will retire now to heal, and try to get back to some kind of normality. A few people I've already been in touch with asked how they could help. At the moment, we need to work this through ourselves. But as our world was tumbling, the charities First Touch and Ronald McDonald House were there to embrace us. You could help them help others like us - and maybe even spare some of that pain - by making a donation.

Doctor Who: 2013

Episode 799: The Day of the Doctor
First broadcast at 7.50 pm, Saturday 23 November 2013
<< back to 2012

Happy birthday, Doctor Who

 And so, at last, I reach the end of this daft project to find one image from each calendar year of Doctor Who and use it an excuse to waffle on in praise of some aspect of the show. It was my attempt to mark the 50th anniversary and for this last installment I want to talk about the 50th anniversary itself.

Wasn't it brilliant?

Andrew Ellard's wise tweetnotes on the episode, which I largely agree with, concluded:

In short: A vastly entertaining barnstormer that put the title character front and centre.

I'd worried that nothing could surpass The Five Doctors (1983), and there'd been rumours and grumblings about what might be happening behind the scenes. And yet, and yet...

I loved The Day of the Doctor, with its fast and funny and redemptive plot. But I especially loved how it encompassed all of Doctor Who - right back to the title sequence, theme music and even the school from the very first episode. Then, after a single shot taking us into the TARDIS (this time in 3D!), we're in Trafalgar Square - where Rose and Mickey had lunch in some of the very first moments of the show when it returned in 2005.

How bold and ridiculous to explain the Doctor's connection to Elizabeth I - first glimpsed in The Shakespeare Code (2007) and The End of Time part one (2009). How magnificent to see UNIT make peace with an alien species rather than blasting them from the Earth. How brilliant to resolve the Time War with a happy ending, yet without revoking any part of the past eight years of the show.

There's nods to all the eras and Doctors - and the suggestion of all sorts of tales we've never even dreamed of, with a brief glimpse of Sara Kingdom stood with Mike Yates. How extraordinary to get Tom Baker into it, how amazing that it remained a surprise, and how perfect was that scene? I found it so moving that it wasn't until my third time of watching that I picked up on the inference that this is a far-future Doctor. Gosh! and sssh! and aaaah!

What really struck me about the episode, though, was the sense of extraordinary joy. And that was matched in the other special programming round the episode - The Night of the Doctor, An Adventure in Space and Time, the Five-ish Doctors, my chum Matthew's documentary, and everything else. All in all, it seemed perfectly to provide something for fans of every era and style of this sprawling, madcap show.

It's not just been on TV. There's been the return of the missing nine episodes - which I assume was carefully stage-managed to happen just ahead of the anniversary. And this year has seen some of the best and boldest spin-off Doctor Who. (At least, I gather it is: I'm hoping for The Light at the End, the 11 Doctors, 11 Stories book and The Vault for Christmas - but that rather depends on whether I've been good.) Plus there's been events all over the country and abroad, and 94 countries got to watch the special episode together.

Perhaps, amid all these treats, some fans may have missed what Doctor Who Adventures did the week of the anniversary. But I think, more than anything else, it might be the one thing to really bring home the scale of Doctor Who's achievement in lasting half a century.

The comic strip of Doctor Who Adventures issue # 333 (6-26 November) broke its own solemn rules and featured a past Doctor. "Time Trick" - written by Craig Donaghy, with art by John Ross and colour by Alan Craddock - didn't just feature any past Doctor, but the original as played by William Hartnell.

Doctor Who Adventures is aimed at 8-12 year-olds - children who've now grown up in an age where the longest gap between new episodes of Doctor Who has been a mere nine months. Hartnell died in 1975 - before the parents of some of those readers had been born. He played the Doctor between 1963 and 1966 - when the grandparents of those readers were children.

"Time Trick" from Doctor Who Adventures #333 (6-26 Nov 13)
written by Craig Donaghy, art by John Ross
and colour by Alan Craddock.

The end.

Doctor Who: 1978

After episode 491 (The Stones of Blood, part 4)
22 November 1978
<< back to 1977

Frank Bough interviews Tom Baker
Nationwide, BBC1, 22 November 1978

In the early evening of 22 November 1978, the BBC's live news magazine Nationwide (basically, The One Show but without the view out the window) celebrated the 15th birthday of Doctor Who. It was, in the best traditions of a show about a rackety time machine, a day early.

Nationwide spoke first to the show's original producer, Verity Lambert, and then to actress Carole Ann Ford, who'd played the Doctor's first companion (and granddaughter), Susan. Then presenter Frank Bough spoke to Mary Tamm - the Doctor's current companion, Romana. Finally, he turned to Tom Baker, who sat brooding beside him.

What happens next is fascinating. You can watch it as an extra on The Stones of Blood DVD or, ahem, on YouTube. Tom seems in a garrulous mood, or bored, and his answers brusque, even combative.

Frank:
Of course, you are Doctor Who aren't you?

Tom:
Well, yes I am. I am.

Frank:
I mean, all the time - aren't you?

Tom:
Well, I mean I'm not as benevolent as... Doctor Who is not really an acting part but I mean I'm not as benevolent as the character and as kind as the character and even-tempered as the character. But yes, it's just me. That's all I suppose.

Frank:
But you have to be Doctor Who all the time, I'm told. People regard you totally where they see you as Doctor Who and nothing else. Do you see that?

Tom:
Well I don't have to be Doctor Who any more than you have to be Frank Bough!

Frank:
Yes, but I am Frank Bough!

Tom:
Yeah, I know you are. I'm Doctor Who because I only have a fictional image.

Frank:
But I don't have a fictional image. I am me.

Tom:
Of course you do. People don't really believe you exist. They only see you on the television. I mean, I see you at cricket games and things like that. But it's true, people have a televisual impression of you as they have of me. In my case, of course, I play a heroic figure whereas you're associated with rather terrifying -

Frank:
They want to talk to me about sport but they want to regard you as Doctor Who. Now, can't you stop being Doctor Who and become Tom Baker occasionally?

Tom:
Well, of course I can. I do that at home or I do it in the bar with Mary Tamm or somebody like that. But the point is when I meet anybody who's interested in Doctor Who there's no point in presenting Tom Baker because they find Tom Baker very dreary.

Frank:
Tell me a bit about how people regard you and the effect you have on the audience, who are convinced you are Doctor Who. What sort of way do people behave when they see you?

Tom:
Well, I mean mostly the reaction is one of cheerfulness and happiness because they associate me with the children being vastly amused by me or interested in what I do as the character of the Doctor. And they also ascribe to me - such is the gullibility of the public and the potency of television – they ascribe to me all the virtues of Doctor Who. For example, I don't need anything boring like a bank card, for example. I don't even need money now because people make the assumption because I play this benevolent fictional character that I am, you know, that my probity is totally beyond question.

Frank:
So you have to work very hard – if you're not very nice as Tom Baker then you have to be very nice as Doctor Who when the occasion demands it.

Tom:
Ah ha! Yeah, it's not difficult. I get on all right with people – superficially.

Bough failing to appreciate the difference between his real self and his televisual image would ultimately cost him his career. Wikipedia quotes Paul Connew, formerly of The News of the World, saying that the 1988 sex and drugs scandal,

"caused a sensation at the time, given Bough's public image as the squeaky clean frontman of breakfast and sports television."

It's fascinating to see Tom address the power that television gives him over members of the public in the light of the awful revelations about other TV stars of the time. Television was much more influential back then - with fewer channels, fewer alternatives to telly, and bigger, less media savvy audiences. Tom clearly saw the impact of that influence in his daily dealings with the public - and he took his responsibilities to them seriously.

He was certainly no angel - his autobiography is candid about booze and sex and being difficult on set - and yet he tried not to let children see him with a cigarette or beer, or being ordinary and dreary. Even when adults spotted "the Doctor", he tried not to disappoint them by merely being himself. It's striking that Bough seems amazed he'd make that effort.

Playing the Doctor is more than just an acting job, it also involves a public-facing role: you're expected to charm and entertain children off-screen as well as on, there are conventions, signings, charity things. Even years after you leave the role, it's the first thing people will mention. There are all the many people who, thrilled by your adventures, feel kinship, ownership, entitlement (look at how I blithely refer to my childhood hero as "Tom", when I've met him fleetingly a handful of times...).

Is it different from other leading roles? I suspect the presenters and stars of children's TV are the ones most likely to cause offence by not appearing as they seem on screen. But I'd love to know from David Tennant, for example, how much his dad's job as Moderator of the Church of Scotland, served as a model for how to conduct himself as the Doctor. Tom, after all, was once a monk...

Next episode: 1979

Cleaning Up icon

Mr Jackson (Mark Gatiss)
from Cleaning Up,
art by Red Scharlach

Delighted by this artwork from the amazing Red Scharlach showing Mark Gatiss as Mr Jackson in my short film Cleaning Up. (Red also made me a badge of it and one of Archibald the space pirate badger for my birthday.)

Cleaning Up plays as part of "I wasn't expecting that!" at the East End Film Festival in London this Wednesday at 8.30 pm.

You can also watch my short film Revealing Diary free and online. And the amazing Guerrier brothers have shot a third short film, The Plotters, which I will tell you more about when it is finished.

AAAGH! and Mr Stinkle

Another daft AAAGH!, this one from Doctor Who Adventures #264. As ever, it's written by me with art by Brian Williamson and edited by Natalie Barnes and Paul Lang - who gave kind permission to post it here. You can also read all my AAAGH!s.

AAAGH! will return in a couple of weeks with The Very Hungry Master.

Happy birthday Doctor Who, love AAAGH!

AAAGH! celebrate's Doctor Who's 48th birthday today in a bit of silliness written by me and illustrated by Brian Williamson. Doctor Who Adventures #244 is still in shops for another day, and includes a whole bunch of old-skool stuff, including mention of Koquillion.

As always, this AAAGH! was edited by Paul Lang and Natalie Barnes and posted here with their kind permission. You can also read all my AAAGH!s.

Possible birthdays

We need to know our birthdays. The hospital, the Passport Office, all sorts of official forms and documents, identify us by our date of birth. Laws and allowances come into effect depending how old we are. Our age, the people in our year at school, the options we've got because of when we were born – they make us who we are.

The thing is, none of us remember being born. Our birthdays are a matter of faith.

Usually, we know our date of birth because someone told us, long ago. Usually it's a trusted person, who underlined the date with presents and cake and a party. That person might well have been there at the birth: the mum who pushed us out into the world, or whoever held her hand.

These people are primary sources – people who can speak with some authority on the subject because they were there at the time.

There are also secondary sources – people who didn't see the birth for themselves, but whose memories back up the story. The grandpa who remembers what he was doing when he was rung with the news. The friend who remembers the trouble she had having flowers sent to the hospital. They don't prove the date, but they don't contradict it. Their evidence lends weight.

There's also a whole bunch of documentary evidence, everything from the official birth certificate and hospital records, to a time-coded video and the cards – and these days emails and text messages – sending best wishes. Taken together, this evidence tells us when we were born.

But it's possible this could all have been faked. We don't know when we were born because we don't remember. It's possible the people who tells us what day it happened is making it up. It's possible the documents have been faked – the cards would be easy, the birth certificate harder but not impossibly. The woman who throws the parties each year and provides the presents and cake might not even be our mum.

(There are DNA tests to check things like that, but you'd have to already suspect something before you went for the test. That's a fun thing to suggest to your mother. And I know a few people completely surprised to discover they were adopted.)

Even if you prove this woman is or is not your mum, you still can't prove what day you were born on. It's possible there's some huge conspiracy, or just some huge mistake. It's difficult to prove a negative: whatever evidence you present, it's still always possible...

The best we can do is judge the available evidence. We might suggest ways to test it. We might point out the flaws in the evidence we've got, welcome others to scrutinise it, or just name the sources we're using. But after that, it's still possible we missed something out. All we can truly say is, “As far as we can tell...”

And that's just with our birthdays.

There are people who don't like this trust in evidence, the 'authority' of science or history. There are those who speak out against scientific theories, or in favour of medical treatments that the evidence peer-reviewed, double-blind trials doesn't support. There are people who say that certain events never happened or were the result of some god. There are vested interests involved, too: conspiracies, industries and individual egos who profit from belief in their statement. They're all very different, but they all stand against the weight of evidence with the argument, "But it's still possible...".

Like our birthdays, these things bound up in our what makes us who we are. Our science, our history, our medicine, our gods - they define us and our behaviour. So challenging - or defending - them can feel like a personal attack. (Sometimes its meant as an attack.) We should not try to cause offence, and we should make our case with a weight of evidence.

Nor is it enough to argue against a weight of evidence, “But it's still possible...”. It's possible there wasn't a Holocaust or Moon landing, or that homeopathy might work. But then it's possible I was born not in June but September. On Mars. And that I'm made of turnips. These possibilities also need to be backed up by evidence. Until then, they're just so much hot air.

We probably can't know anything for certain – there will always be the possibility of something else. And we should endeavour to keep open minds. But that is an argument in favour of evidence, not one for abandoning it.

We shouldn't just believe what we're told, or what supports our assumptions and desires, makes us feel better or safer. We should challenge our beliefs, however sacred. And we should challenge them with the weight of evidence. Because that's the only way we'll really know who we are.

Who's next?

First it was Oliver Postgate. Then Number 6 and Kaaaaaaahn went on the same day (I imagine them agreeing to meet one last time on the Reichenbach falls). Then it's Tony Hart. Great chunks of my childhood detaching themselves like melting icebergs. I'm going to go all fadey.

I start to wonder who'll be next. The great Tom Baker is 75 today – happy birthday! But also look out behind you.

Because it's not just that the Doctors have been dying in order. William Hartnell died in 1975, Patrick Troughton died in 1987 and Jon Pertwee died in 1996. On that pattern, Tom's got til the end of the year.

Fight the numbers, Tom!

Comforting when worn close to the skin

Nimbos got me two books for my birthday in June, a proper reading book and one for the toilet.

The latter, Nicholas Hobbes's England - 1000 Things You Need To Know is a whole mash up of facts and figures, and quite a lot of lists. The lists - of English Nobel prize-winners or bridges by Brunel - are a bit... lacking in excitement. But there's plenty of top facts and insights along the way, too.

For example, I already knew that wool had been such a major part of the English economy that the Lord Speaker of the House of Lords sits on a comfy woolsack. These days the woolsack is stuffed with wool from all across the Commonwealth.

But I didn't know this little gem:

"Under a statute of 1556, anyone caught 'owling' - smuggling wool to France in the night - would have their left hand cut off and nailed up on display in a public place. Under George I, in the eighteenth century, this was changed to seven years' transportation."

Nicholas Hobbes, England - 1000 Things You Need To Know, p. 355.

Annoyingly, sources for this stuff are rarely given, and I'd also have liked some kind of "Further Reading" section, to help follow up on my favourite morsels. But it's a great toilet book, just as Nimbos thought it might be. And full of top facts I can pinch for my own writing.

I've set myself the target of writing a complete first draft of a short story today. It currently consists of several pages of notes in my notebook, so I should probably get on with it now...

32

Just back from a short gad around Cornwall on the occasion of my birthday. Trained down to Plymouth, picked up a hire car like we did three years ago. This time it was a K-reg Vauxhall Astra, which I pretty much fitted into and which was much easier to drive than the Meganne(though I found it a bit unresponsive in reverse).

Hadn't driven in three years and was just wondering if I could still remember how as we hurfed into the Plymouth traffic. That was fun.

One we were over the Tamar it was all a bit of a mystery. Was a bit apprehensive as I ulled into the steep, grand drive of Tregrehan house and gardens, but it turned out the Dr had hired us what I assume was once servants' cottages or stables. What a terribly dignified place to stay.

The weather to begin with was appalling; we were soaked to the skin in seconds and had to dry our clothes by the electric fire, even on Midsummer's Eve. Worse, the fog was so thick that cars - even with lights on it - seemed to just fade away maybe 50 yards ahead of us.

The Dr explored Par beach - and got soaked - on Saturday while I endeavoured to do some work. Then up to see Suetekh, who already had Scott et famile staying. There was much excitement in the construction of a mammoth chocolate cake; the two year-old assistant chef was much taken with the edible glitter.

We delayed the watching of Droo while small child was put to bed. Me and Suetekh ventured out to Bugle to fetch the take-away, only to discover that despite the heavy rain and fog some kind of contest for marching bands was determined to go ahead anyway. We sat in traffic for half-an-hour watching soaked, thick-coated people insist on enjoying themselves, though even up close the rain snatched away any sound of the bands.

Back to Chez Suetekh to eat, and to discover that the Sky box has fritzed and not recorded Droo. Scott and I are much teased as various frantic efforts are made with laptops and iPlayer and such. But our main concern is that we'd rather wait to watch it properly than see it popping, clagging bits where the connection's not there. After a great deal of effort, it all works out in the end and we sit mesmerised and excited.

After, I check through the various texts from people who watched it on time. "They stole the Time Travellers!" comments Codename Moose. "Holy fuck!" comments everyone else.

We roll home through fog-shrouded, eerily quiet roads. Then next day, with the sun daring to peak through the clouds, we walk the half-hour to the Eden Project. Cor. Just cor.

It is a lunar or Martian spacebase, just a practice version. Suetekh and the Family Scott joined us after the Dr and I had done the domes. We listened to live music, explored the gardens, dallied with ice-cream and Eden's own beer. I bought too many books about the architecture and things, and generally just blissed out. The science and pillow-like hexagonal structures are based on what they've learnt from 200 years of greenhouses and railway stations.

On Monday we went to Charlestown, which the Dr thinks was used as a location in Mansfield Park and Poldark. The local shipwreck museum was keen to tell us that shipwrecking happened all round the country rather than being a specifically Cornish trait. We liked the accounts of local protest about livelihoods when it was suggested making wrecking illegal.

But the museum is a strange hodge-podge, with displays of jewels a bit like Kate Winslet's in Titanic alongside a severed human foot. The Dr muttered that there was "no narrative".

Then we went for a walk, following the coastal path (apart from the bits that were blocked off because the path was falling into the sea). This was, probably, a mistake, because after Porthpean the path didn't seem to go anywhere but steeply up and down. After one climb of 172 steps we emerged onto a Y-fork in the road. And taking the left fork we ended up - some time later - emerging from the right. It is just conceivable that I should have listened when the Dr suggested we turn back.

We stopped off in Charlestown for beer and cheesy chips, and much replenished but bone-tired and sore we wearily made our way home. Stopped off at Tescos for steak and beer, and then I made up for my earlier Neanderthal pig-stubbornness with Neanderthal fire skills on the barbecue.

Tuesday was the actual birthday which began with a good haul of presents: a huge book of castles from the air; The New Five Doctors and Flight of the Conchords; a mammoth book of Icelandic sagas, with a lovely coarse cut to the edge of the pages so in profile it looks a bit like crinkle-cut chips...

Drove to Fowey where we peeked in the bookshop and stopped for coffee. The coffee shop included signed menus and photos from when Tony Blair visited - including one above the toilet in the gents. Then we clambered back up to the car park and snaggled along to Looe to visit the Dr's relatives.

I'd done Looe hill in the Meganna last time, so we parked in the main car park at the bottom and then walked up - which is about just as daft. Relatives were baffled we hadn't driven and couldn't believe we don't own a car.

Poked about the Looe shops looking for saffron cake, but there didn't seem to be any. It seems Cornwall has been quiet of late, and saffron is expensive. One baker explained that they only baked saffron cake on one day of the week.

Having seen off the relatives about six, we made our way back to Suetekh's for tea. The sunny day greyed into rain the nearer we got to her, so it ended up being an indoor picnic. I'd been fed by two separate sets of Dr-relatives, both keen to show their love in cooking, so I picked rather bloatedly at the fantastic spread. New potatoes dipped in hot Camembert is not easy to resist.

And too soon it was gone 10 and we had to be moving. I struggled to turn the car round and got us back out into the fog, and we cruised back to our lodiging without incident. Though as we pulled into the quiet car park another, parked car flashed its headlights. Didn't think much of it until we'd unpacked all our goodies and got back into our flat. And then I wondered if the other car was there for dogging, or to guard against it.

Yesterday we got up reasonably early, packed up our things, washed up and hoovered, and then idled round the gardens where we were staying before falling back into the car. A quietish journey back, with a successful stop-off for saffron cake, and then onto the train. Where, in the seats behind us, a very dull pair of suits discussed their company accounts loudly for the whole journey home.

Tired and with baggage we fought our way onto the Tube and bypassed the rush hour by going to the Antelope, where Terrance Dicks was addressing the BSFA, interviewed by Tim Phipps. Lots of laughs, some beer, some pub grub, some good chatter with mates - how nice to see Paul Cornell well past the worst of his car crash. But soon me and the Dr were both seriously flagging and tried to slip off quietly...

It seemed to take forever to get home, where the cat and many presents and cards were waiting. The cat-sitting sister had been an exemplary guest; washing sheets, hoovering and leaving flowers. I unwrapped presents, got my new sonic screwdriver working (it doesn't make the Dr's clothes fall off, even when used at the same time as the Master's laser screwdriver), and breezed through several hundred emails, mostly saying happy birthday.

And then, at last, sleep. I can feel today in my neck and shoulders how little I enjoyed the driving. It's less the driving itself as the apprehension of other people on the road. But so much done - work and play - and such an expertly judged break. Now I merely have a whole gamut of big projects to get finished, including the small matter of rebuilding the top of our house...