Hey --

I had an extremely busy time this week. On Thursday, the band and I headed off to the studio to record a track for Radio 1 in the UK. They chose a couple of different bands to pick a song that had been released in a certain year -- I was given 1992 and chose "It Must Be Love," which was released first in the '70s but was covered by Madness that year and got to number six in the charts. It turned out quite well, but I was planning on finishing it on Friday night, but the hotel we were staying at in Park Lane had a bomb scare and all the roads were closed off so I didn't manage to get back.

On Friday morning, I was at the Silver Clef awards in aid of Nordoff Robbins music therapy and won an award for Best New Act. Paul Weller presented me the award which was pretty cool -- I've been on tour with him in Germany and he's a great guy. I even got to catch up with him before I had to fly home the next morning.

It was my Dad's 50th birthday on Saturday. My Mum and I arranged a surprise party in the Garden for him. We set up a marquee in the back for a casino themed party and got all the family and friends over for some poker, blackjack and roulette -- wish we'd been playing for real money! I'd have come out loaded! But it was great to have the chance to catch up with everybody, as I hadn't seen some of them for ages because I'm on tour so much!

On Tuesday, we had a slot on TODAY. We did "Last Request" with Jim on piano, which made a nice change from the keyboard we usually use. We had to get up at 4 in the morning for a 5:05 call, which was a bit of a nightmare -- probably the one time jet lag has actually worked in our favour! I think it went well...it was a bit bizarre though because on before us was a cooking segment and outside they had a giant sandcastle competition, which was quite random. The show finishes quite early, so the band had the rest of the day off in New York but I had to do a couple of radio interviews. It wasn't all work though, as my manager arranged for Michael and me to go see my first baseball game! The Yankees won 5-1 on home ground against the Minnesota Twins. It was totally packed!

Overall, I had a great week. I'm shattered now but got a couple of days off to try and get some sleep, thankfully!

-- Paolo