Don't you love farce? No? OK

There are some days when you're happy for your life to turn a bit Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em. A little Chuckle Vision. Some days, you feel the farcical elements of life particulary keenly and are happy to laugh at your part in them. You're totally accepting of the plank of wood on someone's shoulder swinging round to hit you, or the custard pie landing in your face.

I got to work today, and as I stepped out of the lift, I saw there was a man just outside the office door, on a stepladder. He was trying to liberate a particularly stubborn ceiling tile. I always find this an unnerving spectacle. What could tumble out on the tile-wrangler's head? Live bats? A body? At the very least, a cobwebby dynasty of spiders. On this occasion, it was filthy grey water,  emanating from I know not where. At first a trickle, and then a gushing jet, straight into his eyes, running into his mouth, like a leaky radiator in an episode of Terry & June. 'Aarrgh!' he said, as I attempted to sneak around the ladder and get into the office. 'Get me a bucket! Quick! Anything!' he said. Unable to leave a tradesman in peril, I rushed into the nearby kitchen, scattering a cloud of fashionistas as I went, and grabbed an empty lunchbox which I tried to wedge onto the top of the stepladder to catch the water. I hope no one was planning to use it as a home for their organic muesli. But as I reached up, somehow my outstretched arms only served to provide a channel for the water to run down, towards my own head and chest.

Obviously it's not ideal to report for a new stint of work with your most grown-up, sophisticated and fash-wan set of employers spattered with rancid grey water, but I would have been in fairly good spirits about this. However, the episode was soured by the grim-faced reluctance of my co-conspirator to share the moment of absurdity. I was laughing. He was scowling and harumphing and muttering how he got all the worst jobs. Of course, he is half-right. That is his actual, real full-time job, whereas mine is to sit in a comfortable office and look at the internet and make tea, and punctuate this with short bursts of non-arduous tasking. But still, he's the sort of person who would probably put a deckchair up first time. It would be no fun to bake a wedding cake in a giant kitchen with him. He probably doesn't even have any inter-connecting doors in his house. 

Lashings of lift-based awkwardness

I discovered as a child, through reading the young detective fiction of Enid Blyton (who was born on my road, above the DIY shop, blue plaque fans), what a lot can be learnt just by keeping your eyes and ears open. For the Secret Seven, the lesson that a man is more likely to steal and trespass if he has a beard. For me, a couple of days ago, how not to give someone a compliment.

I was in the lift at work with two money-harvesting automatons from the advertising floor.

Overtanned female bonus-bot: I've been wanting to say this to you for ages and I'm going to say it now because you're leaving tomorrow, and I know it's a bit weird because it kind of sounds like an insult but it's not, it's actually a compliment…

Aggressively heterosexual male bonus-bot: [Already slightly insulted] Right…

OFBB: It's just [speaking suddenly very fast] you've got really nice eyelashes and it makes you look like you're wearing eyeliner all the time.

AHMBB: Erm… Right. So you're basically saying I look like I've got make-up on.

OFBB: No. I'm not saying that. You've just got those sort of eyes, they're just, I don't know, sort of… [The doors open on my floor and I get out]

It is this kind of smooth-talking that has led to several magazine closures and a take-over.

Things I Have Seen On My Way To Work That Are Guaranteed To Ruin My Day No. 5489

Today, in Charing Cross Station, a late-middle-aged man, smart and well groomed, dressed in a canary yellow P&O Ferries T-shirt and matching baseball cap, handing out flyers for a P&O sale, surrounded by much younger and wildly enthusiastic young men doing the same job.  Posture: stooped and weary. Expression: looking for all the world like his spirit was trickling away across the concourse like a dropped cup of coffee.

This doesn't mean I'm watching it

I'm very glad that Michael/'Mikey' is in the Big Brother house, as I had been wondering what had happened to the lead singer of the Frank & Walters.

Best ever pronunciation of an Irish 'T' in the whole of pop music.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town…

Today, at work, while I was hunting for an afternoon snack in my bag (mixed nuts – brazils, almonds and cashews, for preference) – I discovered this:

It is incredibly difficult to photograph so allow me to clarify. It is a false nail.

It emphatically does not belong to me. I am not the kind of Jones who suits a false nail, as you can see from this state-of-the-art digital simulation.

So how did it get there?

I believe an extraordinary physical phenomenon has taken place. There has been a female typhoon. I went to see Sex And The City last night in London's Leicester Square. I can honestly say I have never been in an atmosphere so oppressively humid with womankind. Any man present – and I honestly believe there were none – would have felt their Adam's Apples melting away and breasts swelling under their incredulously exploring hands just from the sheer intensity of female hormones in the room. 

As the film began, to riotous applause, the concentration of oestrogen in the room bubbled higher and higher, the electrons of anticipation become more agitated, and the molecules of excitement collided with ever-increasing frequency. The inevitable consequence? An extremely rare natural phenomenon which simply could not be contained. Several rows in the middle – the epicentre, if you will – combusted in a shower of body parts, accessories and cosmetics.

It was not an aftermath for the faint-hearted. Consider the ushers who had to clear the debris from the deserted cinema – for every half-eaten box of popcorn, a severed string of coloured plastic beads. For every drained cardboard cup of watered-down, cola-flavoured drink, a singed bunch of hair extensions.

I consider myself lucky to have escaped with just a stray fingernail in my bag. I could have been extracting my snacks from a stranger's flipflop, their two biggest toes still clenching the thong with the rigidity of utter hysteria.

Maxwell Maltz says… Relax

When I'm on the train in the morning, I always take a keen interest in the reading matter of my fellow commuters. This is because I'm insecure about all the books in the world I haven't read. Today I sat next to a man who was engrossed in this:

He was reading a chapter called 'How To Relax And Let Your Automatic Success Mechanism Work For You'. 

It was unclear from my vantage point whether we are all born with one of these or it comes free with the book. I am going to redouble my efforts at relaxation and see if wealth and spiritual contentment pursue me through the cosmos.

I'm a believer

Regular readers won't be surprised to know that An Audience With Neil Diamond was, for me, the jewel in the crown of Saturday's wondrously déclassé televisual buffet. When I lived with Miss Hogg, we would occasionally enjoy a game of Celebrity Bingo if one of the An Audience With… shows was on. A point for spotting Patsy Palmer, Claire Sweeney, Eamonn Holmes… maybe two points for the slightly more exotic Pat Cash or Richard E Grant.

I'm proud to say that Neil Diamond attracted a number of guests drawn from the more culturally elite: John Sargeant, Alex James, Alison Steadman, Ben Miller, Judi Dench and, brilliantly, Germaine Greer. (At one point, I thought that La Steadman was sitting next to Steven Berkoff, but I think I might have been hallucinating with excitement.)

It was as though someone had arranged a coach trip from the Hay Festival or the National Theatre. 'Make sure you use the toilet before we set off, because we're not stopping at services. And that means you, Dame Judi.' 'Germaine, please stop holding up aggressively feminist slogans to lorry drivers in the next lane. Sit down properly in your seat.'

Had I been the director, I would have massaged the schedules to enable them to squeeze Forever In Blue Jeans on to the set list. And Solitary Man. If it was good enough for Johnny Cash, it's certainly good enough for Samantha Janus and Carol Decker out of T'pau.