Saturday 15th January

I made �217.50 today, largely through selling Warminster Highbury Youth FC showerproof jackets. I feel that something odd may be afoot with that football club, because all the people that come in to buy their merchandise are blank-eyed and hollow-voiced. Whenever I ask then if they enjoy having a child or children in the club, the always provide me with the same answer: "Maggie Duncan is a marvellous woman and Warminster Highbury Youth FC is the best football club that my child has/my children have ever belonged to." They've been hypnotised good and proper, because the football club even conjugated the verbs correctly for child and children.

The Athenaeum Ghosts waved to me as they chased a bunch of UFO hunters down High Street. I flicked V-signs at them and yelled at then to get a life.

Altogether, the shop made �829 this week.

Monday 17th January

I thought I'd try and see how many things I could still say in German:

Der n�chste Zug ist um viersehn Uhr.
Hallo. Wie heisst du? Ich heisse Georg. Gruss dich, Georg. Und wer ist das? Oh, das ist* um*
Ich heisse Super-fantastisch. Ich trinke Champers mit Lachsfisch.
Nehmen Sie die erste Strasse links.
Hast du Geschwister? Nien, ich habe sie get�tet.
Ich wohne in Southwick. Es hat zwei Bettengesch�fte.

Unfortunately, whilst I was practising my German by reading the fire extinguisher instructions aloud, the Colonel decided to drop in, the annoying old kiddyfiddler. He never buys anything - he's just trying to have a letch at the children who come into the shop. This is a pretty lame tactic, though, because nobody ever comes into the shop anyway. Well, there I was, speaking German, and he went all mental on me, yelling about "those blasted Gerries" or whatever. I had no hesitation in setting Sally on him, but once he took one look at her teeth and claws (which I had cleaned first thing this morning) he hobbled away as fast as his poorly manufactured and ill-matching prosthetic legs could carry him.

I made �151.50, despite having hardly any stock. And now that I have a million Matravers sweatshirts, nobody wants to buy them any more.

Tuesday 18th January

A jester on stilts walked past the shop juggling rubber fish this morning, so I knew that I'd be able to have some fun. Lo and behold, the town crier was wandering up and down, from the top of Market Place to the bottom of High Street, ringing his bell and bellowing nonsensical announcements to the People of Warminster. From one of my previous missions to the cellar, I recalled that the shop possessed the tools that I required. For the rest of the morning, I say in the shop doorway in a deckchair, a patio heater at my feet, a loudhailer in my lap. Every time the crier rang his bell, I'd yell: "Bring out your dead!" into the loudhailer. At first, the crier totally wasn't psyched out by me, but as I kept on going, he became gradually more and more fazed until eventually he folded and I won. Now that was fun.

After lunch, since the crier had disappeared, I moved out of the shop doorway and people were no longer intimidated and came into the shop. I made �78 in the afternoon.

Thursday 20th January

A violently pink can careered straight into Mantrap Hair Design this afternoon. The salon lived up to its name in more ways than one. Firstly, the two men in the cab of the van were unable to be freed for hours. The interesting bit, however, was at the moment of impact. Once the glass of the shop front was shattered, the souls of lost men who had been trapped over the years screamed with freedom and escaped outwards and upwards. One particularly dopey soul mistimed his ascent and crashed straight into the traffic camera, which was quite funny. I don't know where the souls went - maybe to fins their vacant bodies to make up for lost time. The hairdressers were pretty angry that they escaped. I wonder what they used the stole souls for. But I'm not curious enough to book an appointment with them

Lots of people were attracted by the sound of liberated souls. And, of course, by the bondage gear that the van had been carrying that was strewn liberally around. As they stood watching the salon or nicking bondage gear, many people suddenly realised that they needed to get odd bits of uniform for their children. In this way, I made �138.50.

Friday 21st January

A very quiet day in the shop: I've only made �44. Once I've finished writing this entry, I'm going to close the shop early and head up to Nottingham. I'm going to try and stop Miranda from marrying Chris Cairns, with the help of Toby, Big Jack, Darz and Shula. Yes, Cairns is an international cricketer with an excellent slower ball, but his intentions have nothing to do with love. Kiwi cricketers are notoriously underpaid, and he's clearly after Miranda's money. After all, she's hardly secretive about her castle, plus the chateau in France and the armed fortress in Thailand. In fact, we must be really good friends, because she's always rubbing our noses in it, going on about her indoor duck pond and outdoor billiards room etc. etc. It's just as well we're such good people. Miranda's so special that I'm even taking Saturday off.

Monday 24th January

Carol took �130 on Saturday, so that was a total of �608 for the week. Today, I took �167. The computer was completely screwed up, though, and had to be rebooted every time somebody wanted to buy something. I spent a vast portion of the day speaking to Edward down the phone, trying to fix the Evil One.

Onto more interesting things. Nottingham was a laugh. Obviously, it was nowhere near as weird as Warminster, but nowhere is anywhere near as weird as Warminster. We successfully convinced Miranda not to marry Cairns, exposing him as the fraud that he was. I can't really see what she say in him, especially not with that hideous hair. Miranda didn't seem that upset about getting rid of him just like that, but the presence of an entire Gilbert and Sullivan Society does put a limit on how bad you could feel about anything. Apart from, perhaps, losing the Ashes.

Once Miranda had sent Cairns packing, we all set about making full use of their wedding reception. It seemed a shame to let the buffet and free booze go to waste, after all. Shula got completely wasted, because she didn't want to be aware of when we started humiliating her by singing the Shula Song. As a consequence, she ended up getting off with the most inappropriate man she could lay her hands on: Chris Cairns. Oh, how we laughed. Especially Miranda.

We stopped laughing when we had to spend most of Sunday trailing Cairns and Shula to Heathrow. She was still pretty out of it, and he was trying to drag her back to New Zealand - a forced elopement. Cairns' dastardly scheme was once again foiled, and I still managed to get home to Southwick in time to go to work again today.