OK I admit it - I am DEEPLY ashamed that I haven't updated my blog for what is nearly a year - I can't believe it's that long and I feel pathetic...grovel grovel...

What news? Well I'm still writing my columns in NOW and YOURS magazines, I've lost a stone (YEE-HI!) I'm doing lots of presenting as well as being back on The Alan T Show, have spoken on two cruises this year, and I'm really enjoying being a regular guest on the brilliant Steve Allen's Show on LBC. It's been a great year for catching up with treasured friends and spending more time with my beautiful daughter Kate, and I have discovered a fantastic osteopath (Nick Potter in Harley St) who has not only sorted my back out (all that hunching over the computer, trying to meet deadlines) but he's also managed to stop my lifelong appalling habit of snoring!! (which is such seriously good news that I can actually admit I used to, because now I don't - if you see what I mean...) My husband Patrick can't quite believe the tiny feminine sigh's that are my only nightly utterance - he is such a happy man!

Still clearing my clutter (how the hell have I managed to accumulate such an enormous amount of junk?!?) but I'm finally winning the battle. I'm really missing acting at the mo, but there's something very exciting on the horizon - finger's crossed - everything crossed in fact - and I'll keep you posted (PROMISE!)

Love and more grovels,

Julie xx

Yoo-hoo! Haven't updated my blog for ages as life has been bonkers again - no complaints, I just need to get it all in balance. I now have three columns which is great, but does account for why I'm spending most of my time hunched over my computer. Check out NOW magazine, YOURS and No.1 (Scotland's equivalent of OK) if you'd like to send me a sex-related question - I'll do my best to answer it asap!

I've also started filming the Alan T Show again, which is as much fun as always, and I'm also really enjoying regularly reviewing the papers for Steve Allen's Sunday morning radion show on LBC 97.3 FM (I'm on again this Sunday 21st, between 9 and 10am). I just don't know how he gets away with being so outrageously rude about so many celebs, but he's unique - and I'm really grateful for the fantastic publicity he gave us for my recent Actresses' Attic Sale. We had our best turn-out ever this year - the doors opened at 11am, and the queues started forming at half eight in spite of the rain! We made over £600 on the door for Lynn Faulds Wood's charity (www.bowelcancer.tv) and had our best line-up of star stallholder's ever - GMTV's Penny Smith and Lynn's husband John Stapleton were doing a roaring trade, Carole Malone was flogging Shilpa Shetty's sandals from Celebrity Big Brother, and Amanda Burton (Silent Witness) was selling some amazing stuff.   (I did contemplate parting with my singing ash-tray from Cleethorpes but just couldn't bear let it go when push came to shove - as it did - literally.) 

Getting ready this weekend to go to a Buddhist wedding at Taplow Court in Berkshire, the centre for the Buddhism I've practised since 1983. We're also meeting up with lovely Wendy and Leigh, who we met on the cruise in Feb, and who've been holding onto a bag of shells, starfish and other seaside-related souvenirs since then (stuff we knew we wouldn't get through the customs in New Zealand, where they arrest you for being in possession of a banana). I only hope the pong from the bag isn't too overwhelming - apparently Leigh has been storing it under her bed (now that's friendship and a half I reckon!)

Love Julie x

Hi there,

Down in beautiful Cornwall where we have a cottage - blue skies, clean blue sea, mussels and chips, Farrow and Ball (very upmarket here now since Doc Martin) and endless seagulls.... We featured in the Mail on Sunday recently, but they forgot to put the link to the rental agents we use (doh!) so if anyone reading this is interested in a lovely fisherman's cottage with three bedrooms (sleeps six), a sheltered sun-trap patio garden, big kitchen, dining room, sitting room, and roses round the stable door, then take a look: http://www.johnbraycornishholidays.co.uk/holiday-cottage-408.html

Had a hilarious supper last night with our fab friend Busy Lizzy - she's the finest gardener in Britain (except for Mr Titchmarsh of course!) as well as being one of the loveliest, funniest people we know. We played Balderdash and I won (I'm horribly competitive) and I didn't even cheat (which I normally do...) Haven't laughed (or drunk) so much in ages...thank you Lizzy!:0) 

Hi there,

Well we've done 'Cash in the Attic' and made £643 for the charity my friend Lynn Faulds Wood founded - Lynn's Bowel Cancer Campaign (www.bowelcancer.tv) Although it wasn't heaps of dosh (the singing ash-tray just didn't make the grade) it will at least raise awareness for all the fantastic ground-breaking work that Lynn is doing for all kinds of cancer research. It's never easy to talk about bottoms on TV, and Lynn was thrilled that we'll get a lot of exposure (no pun intended) for this second commonest form of the disease after lung cancer. 

I've also decided to have another 'Actresses' Attic' Sale' on Sunday Sept 7th (again at 'The Old Sorting Office' on Barnes Green) and this year we'll also dedicate the proceeds from the door to Lynn's charity. It's only a quid to get in but it's amazing how it mounts up - last time we did the sale we got Time Out's 'Pick of the Day' and we had queues half a mile long down Barnes High St!! It's always exhausting but really good fun, and there are ASTOUNDING bargains to be had, so if anyone's reading this and fancies rifling through some fascinating antiques/bric a brac for the best prices around, then please come along (it runs from 11am to  4pm) There's delicious food to be had and Barnes village is achingly pretty - plus lots of famous faces from the world of TV will be clearing out their nooks and crannies just for you!

Happy Easter!

Help! I can't believe it's already nearly April, but thought it was about time I updated my blog when the last entry was Happy New Year...

It's been a jam-packed one so far - the highlight being a Fred Olsen cruise from Peru to New Zealand, via the Pitcairn Islands, Tahiti, Bora-Bora and the Cook Islands (I know, it's a bind, but someone has to do it...) I was giving talks on a variety of subjects - acting, a memory makeover, teddy bears - and my husband Patrick and I devised a quiz that went down rather well - it's a take on 'Call my Bluff' called 'Spot the Porkies' (always been fond of a classy title). Please contact this website if you'd like to book us for weddings, barmitzvahs, or after-dinner jollities (that was intended as a joke but maybe it's not such a bad idea?!?)

We also managed to visit my fab older sister Lilian when we were in NZ - such a beautiful country and everyone seems so easy-going and healthy. I reckon it must be all that Manuka honey - Lil lives on it and she has the appearance and energy levels of someone half her age. When we were kids I used to dream about visiting all the exotic places that featured in my stamp collection, and now I've been lucky enough to actually visit some of them I've started collecting some of their stamps again - my friend CB tells me my Raratonga specials will be worth a fortune on Ebay one day.

At least they're easier to store than all the rocking horses which are adding to the ludicrous amount of stuff that's currently driving me potty. I've agreed to do a celebrity 'Cash in the Attic' to clear the decks in fact, and raise a bit for charity - I just hope all my junk is worth something, otherwise it'll be toe-curlingly embarrassing. Michael Winner has just recorded one and apparently all his stuff was inlaid, bejewelled and worth a fortune. The only inlaid thing I own is a shell ash tray that sings 'I do like to be beside the seaside' every time you press its whelk. Now that should fetch at least a fiver...  

Hi everyone - hope 2008 is all you wish it to be and more...It's been ages since I've added any entries - partly due to being incredibly busy, but also due to the fact that my younger brother, David Peasgood, became very ill at the end of last year, and died suddenly in November - a huge shock to all who knew and loved him, and a tragic loss. He was amazingly multi-talented and had one of the brightest and best minds I've ever encountered. If anyone reading this has to go into The Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead for any treatment, I suggest doing everything you can not to - a lot of the nurses were lovely, but the consultants weren't upfront (or even traceable) making his final hours a fiasco...

Writing-wise things are going really well - I'm currently working on my second book - and I've just been taken on by a brilliant literary agent, Ali Gunn. I'm also starting an agony aunt column in 'First' magazine - a fab new glossy that's a great read and covers a lot of issues - do check it out. Enjoyed going through the papers and covering a lot of really important issues with Steve Allen recently (shopping, ice cream, shopping, brussels sprouts, shopping) on his Sunday morning LBC show - I'm on again at 9am on Sunday 13th Jan if anyone's interested to hear more about how the one-way system affects shopping in Richmond...serious stuff.

I'm also back on The Alan Titchmarsh Show on Tuesday Jan 15th, which I'm extremely happy about, because he's lovely - another multi-talented man and fantastic to work with too. I'm starting the year talking about healthy aphrodisiacs, and then moving on to sexercise and naughty board games to play in the privacy of your parlour - dirty dishes, dirty dancing and dirty dice...

Ohmigod I WON!! I am now 'Best Erotic Writer' courtesy of Scarlet magazine!!! I had absolutely no idea that I was going to get the Award - in fact I was convinced I hadn't because my publisher texted just before and said not to worry because 'just being nominated was the most important thing..' and we were sitting miles from the stage - and there were no cameras trained on our table (the event was being filmed for a Channel 5 documentary).

But my name was read out and I am now staring with enormous pride at my mantelpiece where my trophy is displayed in all its glory! A HUGE thank you to everyone who voted - I'm very grateful and still on Cloud 9....

Had lots of giggles on the Alan Titchmarsh show last Friday - I'm on again next Tues 16th Oct - and Patrick and I were VERY excited to be in the audience for 'Strictly Come Dancing' last Saturday (fave prog). I'd rather eat my own feet than perform in the show though - I think they're all incredibly brave. I'd eat any of those nasties in the jungle like a shot (I mean the witchetty grubs not the other contestants) but quick-stepping before Arlene would make me wobble all week. Come to think of it, I do that anyway..must stop enjoying pies immediately. Well maybe just one to celebrate....

Love Julie x

Hi again,

Meant to update blog before but everything's suddenly been a bit crazy. No complaints though, I actually like it that way - for a while at any rate. I've always had a horrible fear I'll be one of those people who'll suddenly spontaneously combust from overdoing things, and all I'll leave behind is a pair of shoes with a little wisp of smoke curling out of them...(that's what comes of reading too many medical dictionaries when you're eleven). I was a skinny little weed back then (in fact I was nick-named 'Miss Swan Vesta' at school which didn't exactly make me feel great in the self-confidence stakes). Nevertheless I still persuaded my mum to take me to the doctor's for elephantiasis, then heart failure, then it was Gilles de la Tourette disease (look it up - it's scary) and finally the spontaneous combustion paranoia. He finally diagnosed me with severe raging hypochondria...strange that.

Anyway, talking of :0) SHOES :0) - I have just bought the sexiest pair of black patent stilletoes that are positively shameless - and I'm going to christen them on The Alan Titchmarsh Show next Friday 12th Oct. It's my third appearance and I seem to have become their 'Sex Guru' (Alan's word not mine - but I'll do my best to live up to the title!) This time I'll be talking about how to put the spark back into your love life with surprises - be warned, there are some very funny ones in store.....and rather a lot of flesh....

Keep a look-out for 'First Magazine' at the end of the month (Oct 30th issue I think, but these things often change). I'm writing a feature for them on my top 10 Favourite Sex Toys. I had a steady succession of large anonymous brown boxes arriving constantly when I was researching my book, and month's later the postman still won't look me in the eye...bless.

Thanks to everyone who's been checking in, especially Julia's Dad! I'll try and write back when I can,

Lots of love,

Julie x

Hi there and thanks for visiting - the site's being updated all the time, so please keep checking in!

I'm sitting typing this with my new shorn locks - yep, after 20 years I've finally had it all cut off (very liberating but I do get a bit of a shock every time I catch myself in a mirror...) I was filming in the north last week, and because my hair now needs blow-drying to look OK, I was desperately trying to persuade a salon in Grantham (Scotts - great place) to squeeze me in as an early morning emergency. I explained to the guy on reception that it would be really easy - and in fact my husband Patrick had done it yesterday, so please, please could someone just give me a quick blow-job

..oops...

Been busy filming a new travel programme in Spain's Valencia too - a fascinating city. I get excited even looking at my passport, despite the fact that my photo bears a startling resemblance to a Chihuahua (I'm not joking - and that was before I had my hair cut).

More immediately, please buy the October issue of the wonderful 'Scarlet' magazine if you fancy reading my 'Voice of Experience' article in it. A big thank you too, to everyone who voted for me as Best Sex Writer of the Year in their Awards. The winner will be announced at a ceremony on Oct 11th - I'll keep you posted!

Bye for now - back soon - love Julie x