I’ve lost a veil. Lord knows how, between Bethnal Green and Southampton Camilla’s veil has gone missing. But it’s been one of those days. I get another letter from the bank, telling me that the documents I sent weren’t adequate to prove my identity, and after a very long, trying conversation with the nice but not overly helpful string of representatives at the bank, I establish that my credit score wasn’t sufficiently high enough. Excuse me? They require me to send in a certified copy of my passport or my driver’s license. After pointing out a few anomalies on the sheet of instructions I was originally sent, I establish that actually it’s not up to the bank, it’s something to do with the credit agency. So I get the number of the credit agency, and call them, all set to vent my spleen. I get a recorded menu, no option of which will allow me to speak to someone real. I find their website, and choose to view my record online. I fill out all the little boxes, then fill them out again (your password needs to be between 6 and 8 characters; we do not recognise that address; please re-enter your password) and again, only to be told that they cannot verify me at my address, so I need to send in – you guessed – a copy of my passport and my driver’s license, plus two recent utility bills (not mobile phone) or bank statement. I find another number, I ring again. This time I’m told by the equally cool but not very helpful lackey that they cannot verify me at my address – despite having access to all my bank details and the electoral register.
- So someone else is using my identity from another address?
- I’m sorry, madam, we can’t tell you why we can’t verify you at your address, that’s why we want the identification.
- But I’m very concerned about this.
- I’m sorry, but I can’t alleviate that concern.
- So if I send you the documents, you will tell me what’s happening?
- We cannot tell you why we cannot verify you at your address. Once we have verified you at your address, then we will let you know that the matter has been resolved.
- But will you tell me why you could not verify me at this address?
- If we told you that, madam, then there would be no point in our security procedures [in other words, "If we told you, we'd have to kill you."]
Nearly bent double with frustration, I say goodbye. Politely. Then scream at the top of my lungs, for a very long time.

Clearly, I contracted the exploding bug. I’m still unable to eat anything, and today Deb and I had to make a final revision to the music cue recordings – more chant, more polyphony. I stand well clear of her so I don’t pass the bug on, consequently you can barely hear me singing. But that’s just as well. The bank have written to me asking for more identification and proof of address. I don’t need this, I need a chequebook! I’ve already virtually cleared out my own account paying for fees and materials for the show, and my VISA card is bending under the weight. So I drag out some more documents and put them in the post. Early night tonight.

So, yesterday we all met up in a rehearsal studio in London for the first read-through. Hugely exciting and, of course, I’m late courtesy of SouthWest Trains and exploding children – Son 2 was up all night with tummy trouble, and we fear he won’t make it for his class assembly. I leave the house with trepidation, and guilt. When I arrive, everyone’s there, probably for the first and last time before we actually perform the piece – Sue, Eugenia, Jamie, Anthony, Perrin, Fiona, Deb and me. I’m awestruck by the experience. The script couldn’t be more perfect, the actors and directors more committed. Have to sit through our frontroom recordings of the music, cringeing inwardly. I bring out the buknuk and demonstrate how it looks great as a wimple – Perrin demands that we have a tour wimple with “Fallen 2006″ on the back. He’ll regret it. I then talk too much about early modern nuns, women, courts, priests and porn etc. It’s OK to push the crap button, as my PhD supervisor calls it, but I don’t know when to stop. Or, at least I realise about five minutes too late. “Sorry, I’m crapping on again, aren’t I? I’ll stop talking now,” and I fold my hands in my lap and stare at the floor. To be fair, no one was looking bored, but they’re actors, right?

Anthony, Perrin and I have a drink in the pub while sorting out finer points of the music, and then I set off for my friend’s, bottle of rose in my case. I arrive about 8.30, and it’s like we’re teenagers again. We talk until after 11pm – her kids are slightly older than mine, 14 and 12, so they just did their thing and put themselves to bed. She doesn’t have a copy of her book at home, but assures me that she hasn’t revealed anything untoward about me. Phew. We talk about relationships, kids, old times – I tell her that after 9 years I still fall in love with my husband every day. He rocks my world and I fancy him something chronic. We agree that this is something very rare, and that I’m very, very lucky indeed.

I woke up at about 6am, which is normal, feeling sick as a dog, which is not. I realised that the night before I had at least half a bottle of wine, on only a bowl of watery soup in the pub and half a mango with Suz. Not normal, either, but not unmanageable, or so I thought (maybe she was pouring more in my glass than hers without me knowing). By around 8am I was really feeling rough and couldn’t eat a thing. Suz kissed me goodbye and left the house with her kids, telling me to let myself out. I left at around 9, and moved very slowly back to the Silverlink station. By the time I made it to the studio, I could barely stand up, and ended up losing my tea. In a break I witter a little about Renaissance attitudes to the voice, and women’s voices in particular, but can’t sustain even that, and wilt into a peevish heap.

Eventually, being no use to man nor beast I left the rehearsal and made my way back to Waterloo. I bought Suzanne’s book at WH Smith and read it on the train home – no editing in my state. It’s highly amusing, and didn’t shock me a bit, regardless of its reviews. Although I could never imagine myself in any of the situations she gets into, I just kept thinking, “That’s my girl!” She seems happy, which is what counts. Pete picked me up and brought me home, and I collapsed into bed for the rest of the afternoon. Still feeling rough at the end of the day.

Couldn’t wait to see what the fabric would look like washed and dyed, so before breakfast I cut up some lengths and got the washing machine going. It’s come up all matted and felted, and the colour of a mongrel dog. Perfect. Vile cloth, that’s what the Order of St Clare says! But the raw fabric, a brushed cotton, leaves lint all over the living room carpet that won’t hoover up, no matter how hard I try. Does every musicologist have to put up with this? I don’t think so. I’ve arranged to spend tomorrow night with my best friend from school, Suzanne (see previous post). We haven’t seen each other in ages, and I felt a bit cheeky emailing her and asking, but she rings back saying of course I can stay. She tells me she has written an erotic memoir, and is now in the top 50 bestselling list. “You’re in it,” she chirps. Blimey! And I google for a searchable copy on the web, but no such luck. Guess I’ll just have to wait until tomorrow night to find out what she’s said. But there does seem to be an awful lot of web coverage for the book. Good for her.

All the fabric for the nuns’ habits arrived this morning, as did the fabric dye. I got back from uni to find three enormous rolls of material in the hall, which I eventually dragged into the annex. I had spent the whole day packing up my office on campus, as I’m being moved down the hall. I’ll miss my spacious room – the new one is probably the same area, but longer and thinner – but I won’t miss baking all day from the heat of the sun. Took the opportunity to empty out files from the cabinets dating back to when I joined the university – 1994. Wow. It took some discipline not to spend too much time doing it – it was fascinating (for me at least). Sad, sad, sad. Tonight I have to go to a committee meeting for the after-school club. I really don’t need the extra work, but if the parents don’t run the club, no one else will. It’s a stipulation of having a place for your kid – you must be on the committee within two years of joining. Sigh. But at least we’re all in the same boat, and we conduct the meeting in an atmosphere of congenial, communal exasperation.

Made a draft version of Camilla’s camicia this morning (6am, natch) fron an old sheet. Found a pattern on the web in a very helpful dressmaking diary – I’m growing in respect for the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) folks. Clinically insane, but hugely helpful!! It wasn’t difficult at all, but I’m glad of the many years of being school-play-wardrobe-mistress, and of my 40-year-old Singer sewing machine. Sewing is a discipline, nothing more, nothing less. I learned a salutory lesson from my best friend’s mother when I was at school. Suzanne and I were incredulous when we found out that her mom had removed and replaced a sleeve from a tailored jacket she made, lining and all, when she realised that the pattern was about a millimetre out. We thought she was crazy, but from that point, I was slowly converted from slapdash needle-monkey to pernickety seamstress, and now I think I would probably do the same. So does that make me clinically insane, too? Son 1 probably thinks so. He came home from breakdancing to find me barrelling down the stairs in a white camicia, looking for the camera. “Here, take some pictures,” I bark. How many 13-year-olds have mothers that flounce around in seventeenth-century shifts?