Apparently the wettest March for a long time, and it felt like it. It was a relentlessly depressing dampness all the way through, but with sufficient breaks in the weather for me to get out a bit more – and at least it has been getting a bit warmer.

A few headlines:

• Miles driven = 0
• Miles ridden = 160
• Alcohol drunk = none
• Petrol bought = £9
• Books read = 11
• Films watched = 4
• TV series watched = 2
• Vinyl LPs bought = 3

At least there were a few events in March to break the routine. There was the official opening of the new Town Hall, which was a great opportunity to have a look around the building, having helped to kick the project off before cancer made me decide to quit the council. Meeting so many councillors of both parties and council officers again brought back a few memories. Likewise there was the hustings event for choosing our parliamentary candidate, which was a great chance to catch up with some party members I hadn’t seen for ages.

Other little breaks from the routine were a trip to our office in Reading by motorbike, and a trip to the office in Glasgow by Easyjet, which was enormously stressful. Thanks to the Manor Royal roadworks diverting bus routes I ended up nearly missing the flight. I think that if I had been a minute later at the gate they would have shut the doors.

I impressed myself with the number of books I read, though I cheated a bit by reading a few thrillers, which always take a lot less time to read then non-fiction or heavyweight books. After reading book 18 in Mark Billingham’s Tom Thorne in February, I went back to the start and read books 1, 2 and 3 and also downloaded a few more to keep me going. I also took the plunge with Lee Child and downloaded the first 5 Reacher books and read 2 of them. I rounded off the thriller selection with a couple of Harlan Coben books. The only non-fiction book I read was Elton John’s autobiography, which was one of the most enjoyable autobiographies I have ever read.

Having read the Harlan Coben book The Stranger, I decided to watch the Netflix series based on it. It was a bit weird because the book is very much set in New Jersey, but the TV series is set in the UK. Given the constraints of trying to cram elements of the story into a different society where certain key plot points wouldn’t even be feasible, I think they did a good job. There were a couple of plotlines introduced to pad it out to a series, but the key elements were all there.

The other Netflix series I watched was The Night Agent. A fairly run-of-the-mill FBI agent caught in a conspiracy-type thriller, but I enjoyed it. Jayne thought the acting was terrible, but the story was good enough to keep you watching. I think I binge-watched it all over a weekend, which is unusual for me.

One of my little motorbike jaunts was across to Horsham for a record fair. I managed to restrain myself and only buy three albums. For a change they were not old 70s albums. I’m sure I will make up for that next month at the East Grinstead and Crawley fairs.

I end the month, as I started it, not a millionaire. Ernie has again failed to give me the big jackpot, but as a consolation I did win fifty quid. I can wait.