If you’ve got an unanswered question you know you’re perfectly capable of answering, just read it to yourself nine times then forget it and let your subconscious provide the answer. (It’s a technique I’ve used for years.)

From being worried about what reading matter I’d take away this summer, the correct answers popped into my head this morning: Walt Whitman’s ‘Leaves of Grass’, Jack Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’, and Orwell’s ‘Down and out in Paris and London’. Three simple paperbacks strangely appropriate to hot chaotic cities and long nights on trains, which I can discard as I finish. Perfect. Next stop Waterman’s. (You don’t buy books like this from Amazon; the ritual of visiting a bookshop makes sure you’ll read them.)