Matt Haig

Me and my son went out dancing last night. We went to three clubs - Ushuaïa, UNVRS and finishing at Hi for Black Coffee and Skepta. The vibes were pure music and no sleaze and no drama. Togetherness. Like the old days. Lucas had his ID checked with the scrutiny of a witness interrogation room. Alas, I did not. I have not fallen off the wagon. I was sober as a judge and had more fun than I ever did raving here in my 20s. Got my steps in. The vibe was all just togetherness and dancing and music. I was once told by a rather snooty literary peer that it is rather ‘unusual’ to have a background as a raver for an author. It’s this kind of nonsense that puts people off books. Books and raving go hand in hand. They are both immersive art forms. And both things authoritarian moralists clamp down on when totalitarian regimes take over. (Ibiza only became party central as a radical response to the fall of Franco in the late 70s. Ibiza, in essence, is antifascist and pro-freedom.) Just a pity now money and commercial interests have taken over. But still, the vibes are still there, especially well away from the VIP areas. (Always the dullest areas of anything.) I love loud music and quiet novels. “Let us read, and let us dance,” wrote Voltaire. “These two amusements will never do any harm to the world.”

Reasons to Stay Alive is eleven years old.

I was asked today why - of all the holiday destinations - do I return to the one where I lived for three years as an addict and ended up nearly dead.

Dear @channel4, You are taking one of the conditions with the most stigma and misuse around it and making it worse. That title causes real damage. Like most conditions ADHD is defined by society. Construct, in the way everything is. Yet it is also biological reality. Studies of twins and families show ADHD is strongly heritable. Neuroimaging shows structural and functional difference in the brain. And, most importantly for all this kind of bullshit spreading, ADHD traits are found to exist equally across vastly different cultures. Can it be exacerbated by cultural context? Sure. So can most physical conditions. Is it overdiagnosed? Well, when random school and prison studies have revealed massive rates of underdiagnosis I would say no. For people like me, branded special needs at school, but never told why, a diagnosis offered so much clarity. I know times are hard but… Stop pandering. Stop trying to be an edgy podcast. Stop trying to create stigma just for viewers. ADHD is not a fake construct unlike this documentary.

Before I was bald I was told I looked like Rafe Spall. Once I even had a five minute conversation with someone who thought I WAS Rafe Spall. Benedict Cumberbatch, the first time he met me, said ‘hey Rafe’. It was all very specific. Very Rafe Spall centric and I quite liked it. In fact, the likeness was so strong that it is actually me, as the villain in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. No one even noticed. Anyway. Times change. Since shaving my remaining hair off I am told I look like every bald man from Pep Guardiola to Bryan Cranston to Bill Burr to Jason Statham to PitBull to Charlie Brown. And I don’t actually look like any of these people. My doppelgänger is now every single bald man who ever lived, from Gandhi to Tucci to Humpty Dumpty. I am literally any age between 35 and 80. I am 36 percent of all men. And I have recently discovered other baldies get this too. This is a thing. Baldness is homogeneity. Baldies unite. We have nothing to lose except our distinct facial features.

Pearl singing one of my top five ever songs, Swim Good by Frank Ocean. So had to post - sorry @pearl_is_a_singer as I love it and the song gives me a mild existential breakdown.