"An ironic, self-reflexive subversion of multimedia brand interaction!" you shouted as you danced.

I'm the intrigued man, peeling back the curtain and standing at the window not only to look at you out there in the street, but also to better show you what it's like living in here. I'm opening the curtains wide both to wonder what the hell you're doing out there in the frost and mist and also to show you the stains on the walls from when Seryn threw that chocolate pudding at Ed, and Ed got scared.

Yes, the lightbulb is smashed, but we have ten boxes of matchsticks left. I stick them in my ears and nose and light them at night to keep a constant glow – replacing them as they burn out. It's like spinning plates. I'd smell my burning nose hair if I could, but when I inhale the wood goes up and jams into my brain.

But that light gets us through the time after the sun disappears around the side of the house.

...until the natural light comes back again, and you stand outside in your coat and fur-lined boots, peering into our ground floor den, trying to make out the shadows behind the tattered curtains and see how five men can live in such a space for so damn long. All you see are bodies draped and immobile like Greek sculptures, and plates and bowls built up to look like rock with the slow, sedimentary deposits of cheap baked beans and sauces and chips and a multi-coloured slew of dried on condiments.

The whole of the house, inside and out, is covered in molluscs and snails and slugs and woodlice and ants and grass grows everywhere, even indoors, like new life in old men's ears.

When Trewin says I can sleep I sometimes dream that I open the curtain and you are stood there as every morning - but this time with a small, blue and white box in an outstretched hand.

I yelp, and the band gather around the window like cats, pressing our faces up against the glass and each squirming for the best view.

You have brought a lightbulb for our room.

Ed lets you in, and Seryn stands on James's shoulders to screw the lightbulb in.

Ed clears the plates away.

You sit down and we talk to you and make you a cup of tea. It's a dark morning, so we're happy of the lightbulb. It's also cold, and we all drink tea with the steam rising up and occasionally hold the hot cups against our faces.

The woodlice go away, and the room starts to breath with the colour of comfort.

Trewin asks if you'd like to hear some of the new bits and pieces of music.

You say yes, and he starts to play it, and we all start to dance in the room that is now so warm, and clean, and bright, and dry.

We have the greatest time, and when I look at you I see you are so happy you came by.

But then more often than not I am awoken by my head smashing against the corner of a desk. I had slipped into careless sleep for a mere microsecond. A match burns its way to my ear lobe as Trewin chastises me for my nodding off. We have been choosing a method of audio compression for seventeen hours now. I huddle into my unwashed blanket and light another match and put it into my nose so everyone can live.

Why please can't someone please just go to the shop and buy a lightbulb?

Tim

Like paying your council tax in the middle of a marathon.

We only said so little over the festive period because we couldn't find the microphone.

I still have floor on me.

We are not bounding into this year fresh. We are stumbling over the line, bow-legged, with relief maps on our faces from fifteen-year-old carpet. We slept much on our bellies as the sun rose. We used crushed tin and glass as pillows and went to buy bacon and mushrooms without our trousers on, wondering why the earringed women would scream so loud when we so obviously had a headache and were not ready for the onslaught of the sane.

Today our mouths smell like bin water and our bones are bending to weeks of these same jumpers and trousers. If we go outside, we risk being picked up by the wind and flung over a hedge.

We won't admit this to ourselves, though. We are fresh, aren't we? We are raring to go! What a break that was! A little break, slap bang in the middle of all momentum, and now we have the pleasure of starting that momentum, from scratch, all over again! Push, boys! Push! If we can't get the engine going, we'll at least hurt ourselves beyond repair, giving us ever more reason to stay in bed and polish our ornaments.

What are you dreaming of for the next year? You should dream, if you're not. Maybe you're finishing a course or something, and you're dreaming of getting top marks? Very good. What a nice dream. Maybe you're dreaming of going traveling, and have been looking at booking something over the last few days? Another nice dream.

Go do it all, you crazy kids.

Maybe you're just dreaming of something in your life getting better?

Keep going, then!

Just don't worry about it, if you dare do that.

What are we dreaming of?

Well, James is missing. We've already got contracts for various things coming out of our ears, and a package all tied up now, I think, for something else. As usual I've been more the card-writer than the florist, so we'll see how all that turns out.

So I guess we're dreaming that we can keep making people happy.

Isn't that nice?

I bet you didn't expect that from me.

So nice and heartfelt.

You can trust us.

Just keep dreaming.


Tim