It's not Friday but the Budget has stolen a day from me.

It's not Friday, but the Budget has stolen a day from me. And caused me to repeat the headline of my blog post as my first line.

It's a cheap subbing trick that the sub editor's desk uses when they can't be bothered to think of a standfirst.

But that has nothing to do with chancellor George Osborne and his "Budget that rewards work"; his stern admonition to those wealthy who seek to avoid paying stamp duty on their big houses, "you have been warned" and various Despatches-box banging to emphasise his point that "Wallace and Gromit must stay in Britain".

 What happened yesterday was basically a later Budget (he usually stands to deliver at 12 noon on the dot) and 59 minutes (with some interruptions from a rather boisterous House of Commons) later, we had to scurry into meetings/to our desks to knock out the stories. In all we did 20 stories for the paper AND 10 stories for the web - from a team of just five journalists (I wasn't writing).

With all that copy editing, and with various hiccups on the way - from the machine at Marks & Spencer not working at 7:30 in the morning (the time I used to get up, last week, before the Budget planning wrecked my sleeping pattern) through to one of the Panelists being struck with a mystery bug and another forgetting to write their blog and various other minor irritations, I was completely copy blind by 5pm. I literally could not see to look at the screen nor even to look at the printed word. Which for a journalist whose job involves writing and reading copy, this is not a good thing.

Thankfully the Santander press office took pity on our poor team and treated us to Benihana's  in the evening - the food and the entertaining and slightly sexually disturbing chef almost banished thoughts of the boy-faced Osborne and his desk-thumpery.

However, it did not quite help.

This morning I was convinced that it was Friday. I sent out a twitter #FF to a bunch of people, most of whom said thank you; one was then convinced it was Friday and got worried that she'd missed a day of work.

I also started telling people I would see them tomorrow (thinking it was Saturday) when it blatantly wasn't and if my jeggings had not been hanging out to dry, I would have worn those to work forgetting that it is Thursday and I have three damn meetings.

Finally, I decided to go for my Friday morning ritual - a Cumberland sausage sandwich on brown bread at the Little Dorrit Cafe. Argle. Now I have to have one tomorrow as well ....

The only reason I can think is that on Wednesday, we did twice the amount of work that we would usually do on a press day and went out and almost died as a result. I think I also dreamt about work, which would add to my time-space-continuum confusion.

So thank you, George, for ruining my week, for stealing more money from female pensioners and seeking to shoo away all the wealthy people from the UK and send them scurrying to the Canton of Uri.

I am sure I am grateful. But you now owe me more than the £171 that the BBC's Budget calculator promises that I will be better off by as a result of Osborne's "working Budget."

Teen bloggers

Dear Diary
Today I saw my new tutor. He was SO fit! I liked the way his tie hangs.
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Today SUX!!! I HATE MATHS (lol)!!! WANNA SLEEEEEEEEP
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My tyre blew up on the way to class, I had to push my bike up the street
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No, my dear bloggers, the Mermins is not regressing into childhood. For her teenage years were spent writing reams of epic poetry, fairytales and novellae. Not pouring out her soul in public angst in some cyber-medium that hovers between the very personal and the 'I don't care who knows about my menstrual cycle'.

Which is what the Merms is ranting about today. Teen bloggers. Bloggers who don't have anything real to blog about. Youngsters today are being encouraged by thoroughly irresponsible tutors to go online and tell the world about the music they listen to, the boyz they love and the girls they want to kiss.

It's appalling. While browsing on Homo Escapeons earlier, he first raised the spectre of this dire trend to vent among the illiterate younger class. Not content with Bebo or Facebook or MySpace, they have ventured into the world of blogging with personal pages that look uber-cool and yet have absolutely nothing to say of any interest at all.

Now that's not entirely true, some youngsters have a wonderful and wicked sense of humour, or a real concern about what's going on outside their pampered little lives. But the majority of teen blogs I've stumbled on have nothing more to say than "I love Edward" in various spectrae of text-speech.

If only the Cyberspace were not so capacitous that it could subsume all this blether and drivel. Why does it upset me so, you may ask? What harm could a teenyblogger possibly do by outpouring their emo-angst online?


Sigh. Life is so unfair

I'm glad you asked.

1) They're not EMO. At least the EMO have something interesting to say. The darkest moments most of these chastity-ring-wearing airheads have to say is their 'poetry' about death, candles and mirrors. Everyone who has ever been 17 has written poems about death, candles and mirrors. It's just not interesting to anyone but you!

2) They don't use proper words. Blogs are there to explore the power of the written word. How can you honestly fill a blog space with lol, strdy wuz gr8! <3 da 3 brgers @ Maccyd's! IMMD?

3) If it's not interesting, don't expect people to read anything. I read one poor soul's tedious blog where they write about a new song they downloaded off iTunes each day. The premise is very interesting - but they don't actually do a critique of the song. All we're told is what the song is and a new picture skiffled from iStoxx of a rabbit or a cat in a hat. If this were an exploration of virtual Dadaism, I would be impressed. As it was, I wanted to poke my eyes out with a spoon.

4) If it's not interesting, don't expect people to post anything. Another young female student was complaining that no-one wanted to post anything on her blogs. But they were so dull. "I went to college, I finished my dissertation (YAAAY) and then I had a pizza. Yummy." IS ANYONE LISTENING TO ME??? No, honey, you were given a $34,000 car for your sweet 16th and you have the mental agility of handcream.

5) If you're going to post such drivel, then at least put up pictures of yourself so we can mock you to your face, a la David Thorne, whose account has been temporarily suspended, but was arguably the best blog that has ever been, or ever will be, on the face of the internet. Although it was probably his mocking of people to their face that caused his account to be suspended.

6) All failing, stick up a picture of a kitten or George Clooney, naked. At least you will generate some mild interest from middle-aged women who tend to like both those things.

As it is, I am sick of having to wade through drivel when I am on the lookout for surprising and interesting new blogs. I have found that the best ones by far are not from students that have all the time in the world to be creative, but who don't actually do anything with their time. The best blogs are from real people who have seen and overcome real problems, who take the time to explain things in a level of detail that thrills, entertains and draws us in.

I'm not classing myself as one of these. Not by any means. But I do know that, if I were a teenager, my blog would be a heck of a lot more interesting. And If I could hack into anyone else's blogs, there would be carnage - delightful, beautiful, carnage conducted in the ether:

Today I saw my new tutor. He was SO fit! I liked the way his tie hangs. I want to hang it tightly around his neck until he DIES.

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Today SUX!!! I HATE MATHS (lol)!!! WANNA SLEEEEEEEEP. Then sleep, my child, sleep. Drink this drink. It will make all the bad maths go far, far away.....

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My tyre blew up on the way to class, I had to push my bike up the street and then the girl of my dreams came up to me. I stopped on a slight hill, which made me sweat even more as I tried to stop the bike from rolling backwards, although my weak and puny girly arms were straining every muscle. She smiled sweetly, grabbed my bicycle pump, and shoved it right up my////////// ACCOUNT SUSPENDED