The girls head out early and I take the opportunity to spend a good portion of the day mooching. It's a solo activity and one that takes virtually no effort - so perfectly suited to me really. I watch the Grand Prix qualifying; it's the last race of the season and one in which four drivers can potentially win the title. It's also in Abu Dhabi, meaning a spectacular day/night race against the backdrop of a desert flooded with money. The seven star hotel that straddles the race track is stunning and lends itself to repeated flyovers by the TV cameras as the sun sets. There was literally nothing there in 2007 - now it's a Monaco for the Middle East and everyone's beaming face during Martin Brundle's amusing pit lane interviews reeks of cash. Or possibly ca$h.
I move from mooching to pottering after Sebastien Vettel is confirmed as the pole-sitter, and do some washing up and general chores before K and Ellie get back. After a suitable period has passed we deem it time to go to the pub, so we walk up through the posh shops of Crouch End towards the Kings Head, where various others are waiting for us. It's a very sports-heavy weekend, and while I have lots of fun chatting to Rich, Tim and the others I am conscious that tonight is the David Haye v Audley Harrison fight (or Ordinary Harrison, as the sign outside the Hornsey Tavern perhaps unfairly dubs him). Aware I probably won't be able to watch it (I'm in a minority of casual boxing fans tonight), I follow it with one eye my phone even as we head to Big Red.
The pub is busy but we find a space - and some of the assembled folks play table football while I follow a laughable third-round TKO by David Haye, and probably the end of Harrison's career. Boxing can be cruel - and I suspect that's how Harrison will remember it.
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