This world seems close, technologically and date-wise to my own world (what I think of as the real Earth – if I lose sight of that, I think I may go mad again) that I’ve thought of turning myself in to the authorities. Maybe they’ll even have a Project Hermes of their own.

In fact I’ve just checked the name on a search-engine, and found there is a site: it’s run by The Imperial Communications Union (‘linking the nations of The British Empire electronically’).

But how could I convince the authorities that I'm telling the truth? I really need to speak to government scientists, but how do you get hold of them? If I went to the police they’d either laugh at me, or if they thought I really believed myself, treat me as insane and lock me up (not too much of a problem – the next sending will get me out of any institution). I could try to prove my credentials by telling them something that’s going to happen in the near future – like Norwich United winning the 2007 FA cup – but this world is different in so many ways that I can’t guarantee that events I remember will actually take place here.

I went to the library, to try to find out more about the history of this place – but I found that the lovely old red-brick building near the station had been knocked down; the library’s now in a new building in the Market Place. It cost me a pound to get in to use the reference section, but at least the internet is free here.

I’ve been ploughing through history books, but things don’t look that different in the past – I think it was in the 20^th century that something must have changed, although I can’t see where time-lines altered dramatically. One thing I have spotted, though, is that Labour seems to have been in political power for the last forty years; I suspect you could call this Britain a socialist state.

There aren’t many cars about. Buses are expensive (I thought a trip across the city would be a shilling or two – I was shocked to find my card had been debited a whole two pounds). That’s another thing, what happened to shillings? They seem to have just pounds and pence here. Odd. Perhaps it’s to do with the change to electronic money. Very little cash is used here – nearly everything is paid by electronic cards.

I suspect motoring is so restricted because oil prices are so high – I passed a filling station yesterday and I was shocked to see that petrol is £15 a gallon. That probably explains the rickshaws I saw at the station – I had thought they were for tourists, but they seem to be everywhere.

I’ve just had a thought. Sitting here in the library, I can see the local BBC studio in one wing of the building. Perhaps they might broadcast me – as a ‘human interest’ story of course. OK, they will probably treat it as a Nutter who thinks he’s been abducted by aliens story, but if there is anything like Hermes out there, my story might just get to the ears of someone who can do something about it. What have I got to lose?