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I can’t remember how the conversation started. Grace, Charlotte, Alex and Rosie were over for wine, and – being a sophisticated bunch – somehow we ended up discussing the international variations of Deal Or No Deal. Rather snobbishly, we decided that the American variant must be greatly inferior to its European counterparts: flashy, over-the-top displays of enthusiasm in a big studio with models and whooping and a large ‘DEAL!’ button prop. Sure, Noel Edmonds might be insufferable, but at least he brings a measure of calm to the serious business of picking boxes at random for half an hour.

Then we watched some of it. And you know what? American Deal or No Deal is (or rather was, since it’s been cancelled) genuinely entertaining. It’s fun enough to watch – at least, it’s fun enough to watch when you’ve got several bottles of wine to hand – despite the ludicrous deliberation over ‘strategy’ which still goes on. Game shows are supposed to be about exaggerated silliness – that’s why they’re fun. And in our state of mild intoxication, we decided we wanted in on some of that fun ourselves. So naturally we agreed to meet two deals later in our own custom-built studio (my living room) and play our own Deal or No Deal, complete with sound effects, an interactive game board and 24 prizes of varying quality.

(I say ‘we’, but it was mostly Charlotte who pushed this from drunken concept into we’re-really-doing-this. She is awesome.)

For the record, as the lucky contestant I walked away with a book of Charlie Brown philosophy and a new found appreciation of how weird we all are (This is probably something which Tash hadn’t warned our new lodger about – her friend Sarah – although she adapted into the role of ‘supportive relative’ perfectly.)

Hello! You look happy.
Wait… are we really using this format? Isn’t it borderline psychotic?

Aren’t we all borderline psychotic? And Tim Harford gets away with talking to himself like this every week in the FT. Is that an ice-cream?
Of course. One of the new perks of our new office is a strategically parked ice-cream van right by the river.

Lovely. But you can’t survive on ice-cream alone.
We’ve also got nice people selling soup, and Borough Market for lunching.

Is everything really going to be about food? What else has been going on?
Well, there was egg hunting with Abbi two weekends ago…

Enough about food already!
No no – not eggs to eat – but big and beautifully designed eggs scattered across London for charity. Emily and I joined a long list of people who helped Abbi out on her quest to photograph them all.

What a good friend you are.
Aw, shucks. But not really – we had the easy day, when it was all sunny out and not pouring with rain. Plus, let’s balance it out with the fact that I got my first tour of the Mayhew from Joshua that day. He’s only been working there for years.

Well, better late than never. Any other friends you’ve belatedly caught up with recently?
Funny you should ask: this week I caught up with Matt, Caroline and Laura one night in The Banker –

– The Banker? –
Oh, that’s our awesome new post-work pub. And then Oliver and I went to Camden the next night for Italian food and a jug of sangria.

Oh look, food again.
Yeah but come on: Camden! Sangria! It’s such a soothing mental balm of happy memories and tasty indulgence.

Sangria does seem to work for you.
Tell me about it. This week is a year since I persuaded Grace along.

Aw, that’s sweet. You should mark this anniversary by conspiring with her uni friends to turn up unexpectedly at the weekend to say hi.
Great minds.

Anything else?
I went to the opera? Aida at the Albert Hall. It’s an amazing space, although I don’t think opera is really for me – at least, it’s nothing like booting a flagging reading list up a little bit by reading Angela Carter’s The Magic Toyshop, which I also did recently.

What did you think?
Well, Angela Carter will always hold a special place in my heart. And although this isn’t my favourite of hers, for some reason discovering that it was published way back in 1967 (I thought it was later) improves it for me. You can just feel the sexual revolution running through it, tearing through the old world without knowing where it’s all going to end up.

Oh, to be young 40 years ago?
Not quite. Nostalgia is bad enough without imbibing the nostalgia of your parents’ generation too. But I do wonder what the next lot will make of us.

Well now, isn’t the sunshine nice? It’s particularly welcome at the moment: today being a gentle recuperation after a high-stress week. Of course, not all stress is bad stress, and at least some of it has been rewarding and productive. Falling into this category was the launch of our new Groupon Getaways site at work – and I have to say, the concept of a holiday is now an especially tempting one. (Berlin, April, here we come.) And while we’re on the subject of work, I need to plug for Rodizio Rico where we had a big Getaways team night out on Thursday night. I’m not normally a massive fan of buffets, but when paired with endless meat delivered to your table all night it was gluttonous and amazing. Very indulgent, but I think we all felt it was deserved

You remember The Room, right? That fantastically awful cinematic phenomenon? Well, good, because now I don’t have to explain how excited Grace, Charlotte and I were two weekends ago to see Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero introduce a special screening at the Prince Charles Cinema. Tommy himself seemed, well, what was hopefully somewhat in-character crazy, and the film itself generated an even more raucous reaction than usual. I’ve never had to be warned “not to throw metal spoons” in a cinema before, but given the quantity of plastic which was hurled over my head I’m glad they did.

And because I don’t want you to think that I’m so jaded I can only enjoy bad things ironically, here’s something good which I very much enjoyed on its own merits: The Ladykillers. Normally I claim not to care very much about actors when watching something – if they’re any good, you should be too immersed into their characters to notice – but I have to admit that this is harder to maintain in the theatre when actions are actually there in person. And so it was particularly cool to see Peter Capaldi (who is great) do his thing as Professor Marcus (who was also great).