Sleep

I’d like to sleep more. There’s no routine: the earliest I get to bed is 11pm, and the average is 1am. I wake up at 5am regardless. Night-time is misery because thoughts race around. I never felt tired untilmy mid-70s, taking photographs in the Himalayas, dragging equipment through forests. I couldn’t move for two weeks afterwards.

Eat

I haven’t eaten meat since I was 12 and saw my pet chicken with its throat cut for our Christmas dinner. I have egg and toast for breakfast, and lots of black coffee through the morning. Lunch is two bananas; I would forget to eat, but the people in the studio get hungry. Dinner is fish. Two nights a week I eat at J Sheekey or Scott’s and have cod or Dover sole. I stopped drinking at 30: hangovers get in the way of work.

Work

What I do isn’t work – bricklaying is work. I go to the studio seven days a week. I have five assistants. I’m instinctively quick in capturing shots. There’s never a pattern: if it’s Kate Moss it will take all day, but we spend more time laughing than working. I’ve published 45 books, and 98% don’t make money. Being working class you worry about being poor, so I put in every effort.

Family

I’ve been married to my wife, Catherine, for 32 years. We have a Dartmoor house, but London is our base – I can’t see Johnny Depp coming to Devon. I have a daughter and two sons. Paloma, 32, an artist, has three children. My youngest son Sascha, 24, has a digital business, which I don’t understand. Fenton, 30, works three days a week as my assistant. I hope I’m a kinder boss to my son than the photographers I once assisted were to me.

Fun

I’ve done 12 oil paintings this summer and I like reading to learn, especially biography and anthropology; I’m currently rereading Somerset Maugham. I’m not very social. My closest friends are Damien Hirst, Brian Clarke, Bruce Weber and Julian Schnabel. But I don’t see them much, because they are as busy as I am.

• David Bailey is doing a talk and Q&A at the Royal Academy, London W1, on 9 September.