Today is a pretty important day. It was August 15th, 2007, when I was told I likely had "three to six months of good health left." Today is six months from that day. Just to prove I'm still alive, here I am, holding today's New York Times! I rode my bike today; the cumulative effects of the chemotherapy are hurting my stamina some, but I bet I can still run a quarter mile faster than most Americans. The doctors weren't wrong; they always said that if the palliative chemo worked, I'd buy more time, but that it was a long shot. And the doctors have done a brilliant job of tweaking my regimen to help my odds. How much longer this will work is hard to know, but I'm going to keep having fun every day I have left, no matter how many or how few of them I get.

Watching Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal.

I fell off a ladder, landed on my back, got up and was fine.

Travelling Europe with a friend, when I was 29. She was driving and the brakes went, on one of those vertiginous Italian mountains. It was terrifying for the 20 minutes it took to coast down the mountain.

Fear is for frightened people. I’m not one of those.

Massive DMT release, your perception of time dilates, you realise you can fly, then it all goes black, and you start again, only this time … you’re a slug.

A strong work ethic and enough wealth not to need it.

Absolutely nothing.

Cockroach stamper at a dried-flower factory.

“I would love to go on a date with you, but I’d be too embarrassed.”