Of course there was a reason why, when I pulled on yesterday's jeans to come to Charlotte Square today, I added a blue scarf from a Delhi market and my favourite blue-and-gold vintage Italian shoes from Mr Ben in Glasgow. But I didn't give much thought to this subconscious calculation until Linda Grant began to speak in the Scottish Power Studio Theatre.

The stack of newspapers in the press pod are thick with Al-Megrahi, and I briefly wonder about the relevance of reviewing a cookbook on this windy afternoon in Charlotte Square.

Joel Joffe is in the RBS Main Theatre, presenting his book The State vs Nelson Mandela about the 1963-1964 trial of 8 ANC members, including Nelson Mandela himself. Joffe was a young defense lawyer at the time, part of a legal team headed by Bram Fisher QC, who would later die in jail after being tried for the same charges as his clients.

Garrison Keillor is a strange one. There’s no doubt he gives great radio. He’s been doing it a while, and as he pointed out in verse to BBC Radio Scotland presenter Claire English on a Festival Café broadcast last week: “The secret of a long career is to keep going and never fade, and not think about your reputation even for one minute.” Keillor’s lugubrious brand of humour, peppered with irony, has so far kept him in work and on American radio  virtually continuously since 1974 with his show A Prairie Home Companion (broadcast in the UK and elsewhere as Garrison Keillor’s Radio Show).

The city is soaked in festival rain; the grass in Charlotte Square is swimming, muddy around the edges. Much like myself, as I find my place in the Scottish Power Studio Theatre to hear Liz Lochhead read.

The writer's retreat is such an uncomfortable venue, it's a miracle that anyone gets through an event. I'm tugging at my collar, squashed amidst enthusiastic bloggers, perched on chairs which were designed by a sadist.