Events around town that aren't booked out.
GVE BLOOD: Two opportunities to donate today: the West End Donor Centre of Margaret Street, Fitzrovia (8am-7.30pm); and outside County Hall on the Southbank (10am-12.30pm and 2-4.30pm). Just turn up
NIGELLA: Another chance to see, and potentially meet, Nigella Lawson, as she talks about her new apps at the Regent Street Apple Store. Free, just turn up, 5.30pm
FREE JAZZ: Boogie on up to Ray's Jazz Cafe on the first floor of Foyles, Charing Cross Road, for an hour of jazz inspired by the styles of Africa, North India and the Mediterranean basin. Free, just turn up, 6pm
BINGO: Play Butchery Bingo, including interactive team games and spot questions, at the Shoreditch Butchery, Cowper Street. £3, 7pm
SPOOKY TALES: Chris Roberts and friends present Scary Stories From Another London, featuring crafty rats, Lido mermaids and the dead boxer of Denmark Hill. Songs and tales at Brockwell Park Lido tonight. Free, 7.30pm
ATOMIC: This month's Art History in the Pub at the Monarch in Camden Town dabbles with science, looking at how the atomic age was portrayed in art, as well as molecular models used by scientists to visualise the very small. Free, just turn up, 7.30pm
MUSIC: All Tomorrow's Parties launches a new weekly gig series at the Sebright Arms, Hackney, featuring the best new bands, often playing in London for the first time. Tonight's headliners are Coves. £4, 7.30pm
MORPURGO: Catch popular author Michael Morpurgo in conversation with his biographer Maggie Fergusson at Bush Theatre on Uxbridge Road. £12, 7.30pm
CAGE RATTLING: An event at Kings Place celebrates the 100th anniversary of John Cage's birth, with an evening of discussion and musical performance around the composer's links with synthetic biology. £12.50, 8pm
Random London Ghosts Of The Day
In the approach to Hallowe'en, we drop our usually sceptical slant, and act like ghosts exist...
Many people have reported seeing ghosts on the Tube network. Covent Garden is famously haunted by William Terris, an actor stabbed to death in a nearby theatre. Ghostly footsteps are often reported by staff at Elephant and Castle. Bank has two ghosts: the shade of Sarah Whitehead (the Bank nun) and a 7' 6'' giant ghost. Marble Arch is noted for a phantom dressed in black, who rides the escalator. A new addition to the roll call was suggested by a lady in the audience of the London Ghost Conference over the weekend. She claims to have seen a ghostly form clinging on to the back of a train as it pulled away into the tunnel. Anyone else witnessed spooky goings-on on the Tube?
Weather
Slightly warmer, slightly dryer, but a thoroughly unmemorable day of weather all round. Must try harder. BBC Weather.
Secretly Hidden False Rumour Of The Day
Greenwich Mean Time is so called because the Astronomer Royal who first invented it was exceptionally mean. He not only refused to pay for upkeep of the Royal Observatory, but also pinched an hour of everyone's time each spring.
