Dom Joly: I'm making Hay while it rains. My wife, at home, is not happy

I can barely remember my previous life before Hay-on-Wye. I distantly recall that I have children and a wife – is she Canadian or Japanese, definitely foreign, but from where?

My existence has been reduced to two little rooms in the middle of a Welsh village. Every morning I swim through the floods to reach the literature festival site where I have been paid to make "amusing" behind-the-scenes reports for Sky Arts. Every day the festival site becomes more and more like the rock festival of my nightmares – the one that has actually prevented me from ever attending one, until now.

Beneath plastic canopies groaning under the weight of water, little groups of smug, middle class people wander about with their organic children trying desperately to find something to do while clinging on to the damp satisfaction of being among fellow "readers", and being able to express the view that poor people smell without being shouted down.

In the beginning there was the "Kid's Zone" tent but that got flooded. Then there was the "Making Stuff Out Of Clay" tent, but that got flooded too and became a huge muddy, clay installation piece that was snapped up by Alan Yentob.

"The Real Hay Festival" – an assortment of travelling shows – was attempting to liven things up in the grounds of Hay Castle. By day three they had completely given up and the whole courtyard had the feel of a disused film set. Only one tent remained operational: that of the street psychic. Presumably he could have predicted all this and set up camp somewhere a bit hotter, but chose not to....

I don't believe in this kind of stuff but I had to be filmed going to see him. He told me that I was going to live a long, happy life, that I was very healthy and successful and that he believed I had a strong creative streak. How on earth could he know that? He finished by telling me that this year was going to be amazing and that I had two wonderful kids with exceptional futures ahead of them. He didn't ask for payment, just a donation if I was so inclined. Of course I was – after that sort of news you'd be happy to shell out 50 quid. So I did, out of the Sky Arts kitty – I'm good like that.

When I got back to my Welsh bachelor pad I borrowed a telephone from a man in the garden and rang home. It's half-term, and Stacey was particularly pissed off at me being away as the kids were running riot. I told her about all the good news the street psychic had shared with me. There was a long silence – never a good sign.

"Did he say anything about me?" She asked

I panicked. I should have known it and made something up but the guy hadn't mentioned Stacey.

"Did he say anything about my/our future? Did he mention a second wife?" She was becoming quite aggressive now, as though we were in some weird, angry court and she was reading a transcript where the psychic described, in some detail, the second Mrs Joly:

"Swedish, 18 years of age, huge tits and very low self-esteem. You will be very happy with her...." I tried to get Stacey off the subject.

"How is everything else?"

"Oh great, the dog has peed on the carpet, we just got a huge electricity bill and the kids are running around with the energy of a small Viking raiding party. Everything's fine. How are you coping with being treated like a local celebrity and having to work, sometimes for up to an hour a day, before retiring to the pub?"

There was no correct answer to this, so I stayed silent. Best make Hay while the sun shines.

More from Dom Joly