Back in the London office and spent a happy hour deleting the 311 emails which had accumulated in the two days I was away from my laptop. It's a good feeling when the still-to-be-answered emails fit onto a single screen.

Prior to the Frankfurt Book Fair everyone in London, New York, Oxford, Melbourne, Delhi, Bangalore,Mexico, Tokyo and Basingstoke is putting finishing touches to sales material, appointment and schedules and travel plans. One of our most important presentations is BookStore and the prootype I've seen looks great. Fingers crossed for a successful fair in every way - more next week from the floor.

Today's potpourri:

Adam Ant's Stand and Deliver has instigated a wedding. A fan went down on one knee in front of where Adam was signing at Borders in Glasgow yesterday and proposed!  I don't suppose you can see the happy event on this link but it gives an idea of his popularity.

Another author, Lisa Scottoline, invented a new publicity wheeze. She has been in London promoting her new hardback Dirty Blonde.  While here she managed to fit in some detective work in the best style of one of the characters from her novels.  Finding out from the in-house hairdresser at the Ritz that Bill Clinton was staying there, she charmed his bodyguards into getting a copy of her book to him.  Two days later she was summoned to his room, and they sat chatting while he was packing his socks!

Last week saw the pub quiz launch of the latest edition of Barry Turner's Statesman's Yearbook. I thought some of you might like to test yourselves with some of the questions. Incidentally, the team from the BBC won. Here you go:

1. How many people are there aged 100 or over in the world
a) 29,000 b) 290,000 b) 2.9 million?

2. What is particularly notable for Brits about Liechtenstein's national anthem?

3. In 1999 how did a recently suspended Air Botswana pilot die?
Did he
a) Jump out of the air traffic control tower into the path of an incoming plane
b) Crash an empty passenger plane into the airline's two serviceable aircraft at the main airport or
c) Die in a shoot-out with the airline's chief executive

4. What does 'Venezuela' mean?

5. In 2001 did King Mswati I of Swaziland order all virgins in the country a) to abstain from sex for five years
b) to have five children each to help boost the population or
c) to come to the royal palace a week later for a panel of experts to find him a suitable bride?

6. On which island in the Atlantic Ocean is McDonalds banned?

7. In which country were the handful of traffic lights removed a few years back because they were considered to be eyesores?

8. For how many years did the longest-serving editor of the Statesman's Yearbook edit the book?