A long letter from Tom Stoppard. Sadly, not to me personally: his signature is printed on. It’s to the members of the London Library, of which he’s the honorary President, correcting some misconceptions about the subscription increase. One wouldn’t think this would be of interest to non-members, but it turns out there’s been some ‘misleading press coverage’. By which he means a piece in the Spectator and letters to the Times Literary Supplement.

He regrets that 34 members of the Library have instantly resigned, while a further 100 have written to say they’re considering leaving come the next renewal, but hopes the letter will persuade them to come back.

Sir Tom apologies for not being at the AGM:

I had a play opening in New York, which entails the duty of attending the previews and finding fault with anything except the script.

But the sackcloth stops there, and he signs off as a firm supporter of the decision:

To be a member of the greatest independent open-stack lending library in the land for just over a pound a day is not an offer for which we need apologise.

***

Wednesday: to the Bank of England Museum with David Barnett. It’s one of those many London museums and galleries that I’ve always meant to get around to. Highlights include the notched sticks used as receipts for the Bank’s first deposits in the 17th century, lots of Gillray and Cruickshank cartoons, and the real gold brick which visitors can handle, albeit through a hole in two perspex boxes.

I can’t even pick the brick up, but David – who is skinnier than me – has no problem. This spurs me on somewhat, and two more tries later I just about manage to turn the thing over. It’s not as light as it seems in films like The Lavender Hill Mob and The Italian Job.

Some facts learned from the museum:

– early bank notes were so easy to forge, the death penalty was extended to include counterfeiters. An example of how punishments can be set not to fit the crime, but to cover the shortcomings of crime prevention.

– the spindle on the which the metal strip is added to banknotes is called a Dandy Roll.

– the ‘folding green’ £1 note became blue during WWII, due to fears of enemy forgery

– I really miss the £1 note of my youth, the nice little green one with Isaac Newton, replaced by the £1 coin in the mid 80s. ‘Decus et tutamen’ said the usurping £1 coin along its side – ‘a treasure and a safeguard’. Handy for my O-Level in Latin at the time.

I also remember the first time I saw a £20 note as a child. It was a thing of real beauty: blue and red, with Shakespeare on the back against a scene from Romeo and Juliet, all in exquisitely detailed thin and tiny lines.

To my childish eyes, it seemed not just an impossible amount of money, but helped instill the notion that Shakespeare was an ultimate role model. I knew that the £50 had Christopher Wren, but the amount of £50 and the whole world of architecture seemed an impossible, even frightening level of responsibility. Shakespeare – and £20 – was a more possible ideal.

I still get nervous on the occasions I handle £50 notes today, and try to get them changed or banked or spent as quickly as possible, before I’m robbed or accused of being a forger. And I know I could never be an architect. Well, if I DID, I’d be the one who made the Millennium Bridge wobbly, making things that have to be ‘corrected’ before they’re allowed near real people.

I wonder if the children of today look at the current top notes – with Adam Smith on the £20 and John Houblon on the £50, and think about becoming economists or bankers respectively.

***

In the evening, I head to Chelsea for Xavior Roide’s Quentin Crisp Walk, for which I’m a kind of consultant. Well, I help him with the addresses and nuggets of interesting detail. There’s six of us – Xavior in lipstick and vintage spiv hat, resembling not Mr Crisp but one of his friends in the Black Cat cafe in the 1930s.

The rain absolutely drenches us to the bone, but we press on. 129 Beaufort Street is still there: the bedsit where Crisp lived from 1940 to his departure for New York in 1981. It’s currently for sale, and I’m tempted to phone up and ask how much. Probably more than an art school life model of today can afford, I’ll bet.

Some of the residents in the adjacent flats emerge and have to squeeze past our party. What must they think of this group of men in lipstick and funny hair, taking photos on their doorstep? An awkward moment, but they don’t say anything. Shame, as I was all ready to point out the history of their building for them.

Eight years ago this evening, I want to tell them, Mr Crisp died. And your building is where he spent most of his life in London, where he wrote The Naked Civil Servant, where he had (for once) enjoyable sex, thanks to the influx of American GIs: ‘Never in the history of sex was so much offered to so many by so few’. And in the 1971 documentary (also on the Naked Civil Servant DVD), he is interviewed at length in the bedsit, yet to be famous, talking about waiting for death at the age of 63. ‘It can’t be long now.’ He died in 1999, pushing 91.

‘They don’t look very Quentin-compatible, do they?’ whispers Xavior as the current residents of Quentin’s old address glower at us as we stand aside. But of course, they’re hardly likely to be flamboyant bohemians. Synthetic jackets, jeans, minimum risk clothes. Economists and bankers, maybe. It IS Chelsea.

Taking in ‘Darkest Pimlico’, where Denis Pratt first dyed his hair and name (the name ‘Quentin Crisp’ a suggestion by his friends), we end up in Old Compton Street, standing outside Swanks Menswear at No. 72, formerly the Black Cat cafe.

***

My own appearance on the walk is free of make-up, purely through lack of time. But I like to think the late Mr Crisp might be interested to know that earlier in the day, I was jostled by Holloway youths for the way I look (ie having dyed blond hair, pretty much), and had ‘Batty Boy!’ shouted at me. A 2007 tribute of a kind.

This was while walking down to the bus stop with David B, at about 1pm. We found ourselves in a quiet side street where the only other pedestrians were a handful of shouting teenage boys, walking towards us. Possibly school boys on their lunchbreak. No way of avoiding passing them. David and I continued chatting, though by this point I was just thinking, ‘Please don’t prove to be stereotypes.’

But of course, most teenagers can’t help being stereotypes of one sort or another. Geeks, Ravers, Punks, Emos, Nerds, Swots, Goths, Chavs, Hoodies. Rebel against your elders, but conform to your peers. The phase of feeling cheated in life, the safety of childhood gone, the cold world of work beckoning, the confusion of choices. No wonder some feel the need to react with aggression or violence.

Except I get this treatment from some so-called adults too. And it’s not because they’re in a gang. I’ve had a lone youth glower at me in the street and hiss ‘Batty Boy!’ as well. And this was in expensive yet liberal Highgate.

At the moment of passing, one of the Holloway number is shoved against me by one of his friends, like a game of Hoodie Dominoes. The old schoolboy trick to scatter blame: troublemakers yet cowards.

‘Oy, watch where the f— you’re going, blondie!’

But they’re walking away at this point, so I’m clearly safe from any proper harm. And one of them shouts ‘Batty Boy!’

I feel like turning and blowing them a kiss. But I can see how that might backfire.

Still, it seemed fitting for a day of celebrating Quentin Crisp.

***

Still royally fed up with this mysterious stomach ache. Have seen the GP, and have had blood taken for yet another test. This time, they think, it might be a food allergy. I’ve been asked to keep a Food Diary, noting everything I eat and drink. Which is pretty depressing.

Food is either boring or embarrassing. What’s good for you (vegetables) is boring to write down, what’s bad for you (chocolate) is embarrassing to admit to.

Am now on a diet not just without meat and fish, but also without caffeine or gluten, in case it helps. No let-up in the pain yet, but of course I want an instant improvement, rather than after two or three weeks. I have visions of Julianne Moore at the end of the film Safe, allergic to absolutely everything.