I’m hitting my chest very hard at the moment. Earlier, at Leftwing Idiot’s, he’d been holding my hands to stop me doing it, but then he’d needed the loo and was worried I’d hurt myself while he was out of the room.…

I’ve just started my Christmas shopping. I should leave it until closer to the end of the year, but as I’ve explained before, I enjoy choosing gifts for people and can’t resist starting early. So far I’ve bought presents for Leftwing Idiot and King Russell and I’m really pleased with what I’ve got them.…

Coventry, normally associated with silence, got a taste of the noisy treatment today as the city hosted a Tourettes Action conference.

Leftwing Idiot, Ruth and I travelled there by train. The air-conditioning was on full blast and Ruth kept ticcing, “HELP!…

I spent the morning risk-assessing a spooky Halloween party at the playground where I work. The children have been excitedly preparing a trail through the woods for weeks. I risk-assessed everything in detail: the trail, falls, trips, the bonfire, and scalds or burns from the food we’d be serving.…

Many of my tics are funny and random, but recently I’ve been saying some fairly nasty things most of which are about myself. For example: “I’m a horrible cunt,” “Shut up bitch,” “Poke out my eyes.”

I don’t feel particularly full of self-loathing or hatred but these negative tics do seem to get more forceful if I’m feeling miserable or frustrated.…

Two weeks ago in a meeting, I banged my chest as I do hundreds of times a day, but this time I felt a horrible sharp pain in my thumb. I tried to style it out so no one would notice but when I looked there was a thick blue mark running down the middle of it, ending in a lump.…

Tonight Living TV aired an old documentary about people with Tourettes talking about how the condition affected them at work. One of the people on the show was the comedian Noel Faulkner who owns the Comedy Café in London that Ruth and I have visited a few times.…

I’m not very well at the moment and have an annoying cough to deal with.

When I explain to children what ticcing feels like, I often use the sensation of coughing or sneezing as examples. At the moment coughing just feels like a separate, extra layer of irritation.…

We’re on the brink of disaster. My team have been closely monitoring imagination levels and they’re dropping at an alarming rate. When that happens, we’re all at risk from the deadly dull-wave, which can sweep over the whole world at any moment.…

I’ve just watched a wicked film with Leftwing Idiot and Poppy called Big River Man. It documents Martin Strel’s 3,375 mile endurance swim up the Amazon. He’s not a natural athlete or a typical hero though what he achieves is incredible.…