I had a lovely day yesterday. I took my 7-year-old godson to buy his birthday present. (Skylanders, in case you’re wondering. As Lou said, you’ve got to love a game that allows a mother to say ‘Have you turned off the Portal Of Power, darling?’.)

I had lunch with six of my favourite people, which involved playing Lego with Tarran and discussing carousels with Evie, among other delights. I was given belated birthday presents, and carried off a lovely photo of Ellis and Tarran and one of those school tea-towels when everyone has drawn a picture of themselves.

I went to be filmed talking about ‘Thrive’ (of which more anon) and, travelling around London, felt proud of how well this great and grubby city is doing the Olympics. (Get a map out, or look a bit lost, anywhere and you’ll find smiling, shiny people in tracksuits converging on you with offers of help.)

I was standing at King’s Cross at 6pm, waiting for my train’s platform to be announced, and texting Ned. We’d been texting birthday-type stuff all day, but this text was saying something along the lines of, have a lovely evening, and blimey, I’m shattered. I became aware of someone standing just behind me, a little too close, so I stopped texting Ned and glanced around to see…. Ned.

He’d finished work and come to see me off before heading to meet his friends. It was the icing on the cake. As I came home on the train, I thought about how I’ll remember Ned’s eighteenth, not just for the birthdayness but also because it was one of the happiest of Thursdays. (And I haven’t even told you about the conversation Ellis and I had about testicles.)