Friday 24th September

K and I are off to Scotland for the weekend to visit my family and generally relax a bit. We have a few errands to run before we head to Kings Cross to get the train – notably one which involves me walking into Wood Green to buy some new jeans, and stopping by Maplin to get a headphone splitter meaning that we can watch films on my laptop together on the train. We do eventually get underway for 11am, though, turning up at an incredibly busy station to pile onto a fully subscribed train. Weirdly it's even busier than when I went up for the bank holiday weekend, and our reserved seats are inconveniently placed one behind the other. I get some writing done in the first hour or so, before I move next to K when the person booked next to her doesn't turn up.

We plug in the headphone splitter and put on Get Him to the Greek – which I downloaded just before we left. I'm not the biggest fan of Russell Brand by any means, but he seems to excel at playing people exactly like himself and is a nice change from the usual Englishman you see in American films. Jonah Hill is great as always and P.Diddy is even good as the scary record label owner. We both have to stifle a few laughs (literal LOLs, almost) so as not to disturb the rest of the train carriage, and find that the film is almost exactly the right length to see us to the end of the 4 ½ hour journey.

We get off the train in Edinburgh and are instantly surprised by how cold it is (though I do take the opportunity to make fun of K for being a soft Englander) while we wait for my brother Jim to pick us up. We head back to his flat and dump our stuff so we can head out for a walk around the city and find some dinner. It is definitely cold – but it's a sunny autumn day, so we dawdle over the Meadows to George IV bridge. I am struck by how unusual it is these days to be in Edinburgh twice in such a short period of time, but also by how different the city is outside of the festival. It is, it must be said, nice not to have to see John Bishop's face on every poster on every street corner.

We all get a little peckish and so head to The Tron for one of their burger-and-a-pint deals (I opt for the cheese, bacon and onion ring-topped Scream burger) while we sit and catch up. We move on shortly after, stopping off for a quick drink at the Brass Monkey – one of my favourite pubs during my brief stay as a student in Edinburgh around 7 years ago. The pub fills up quickly and everyone looks a little weary already, so we decide to head back towards the flat via The Meadows Bar, a rather nice little pub not far from the Commonwealth Pool. We end up staying here longer than we expected (thanks to the tantalising ItBox and the deceptive easiness of the early rounds of their Pub Quiz game) and only end up making a move for home at a respectable 10pm. Back at the house we drink a little red wine before retiring exhausted – we're up early tomorrow to head to my parents' house in the Borders, so proper rest is definitely called for.