Cough

I am in bed in hotel in Porto eating walnuts and fresh cherries.
I know that sounds like the heart of luxury and it sort of is- except what seemed to be London-induced heatwave hayfever is be turning into a full blown cold, complete with snowdrifts of tissues and a heartily painful cough.
It's much cooler and fresher in Porto than it is in London which makes it more bearable, and so does simply being somewhere else.

Tomorrow at the KISMIF conference, I'm doing a talk on the influence fo reggae music on women punk bands, and Gina and Ana from The Raincoats will be taking part in a panel later on in the morning. There will be a Raincoats gig in the evening, which I will faithfully report on.

This is an incredibly busy conference; Lucy O'Brien is also talking, and John Robb, and Andy Linehan from The British Library. Paula Woolf was on the plane over, and it was great to catch up with her in the relative calm before the influx of academics from all over the world; there will be people from New Zealand and Australia as well as all over Europe and the USA, all talking about music scenes, dance cultures, comic books, punk and DIY cultures.

I lost one of my favourite earrings in the Hotel Da Musica here in 2015. Do you think it's still there in their Lost Property Box?