Regular readers may know that one feature of my being on holiday is that I begin to dream again. Normally my dreams are very tedious things. Occasionally, my sub-conscious will try to persuade me that I have to sit a French examination and that I have mysteriously failed to study for it. Quite why my sub-conscious is so obsessed with schoolboy French would probably take years of therapy to discover.

Lately the silent subliminal me has started to make his dissatisfaction with the conscious me very plain. Here is a recent example:

[SCENE: Worcester College, Oxford. I am attending some sort sort of alumni reunion. My fellow students and I are touring our old haunts but no-one will walk or speak with me. My fellow students begin to reminisce about what we were like as undergraduates]

Me: “Er .. well I …”

Others in chorus: “Did all the talking”.

Apparently my sub-conscious thinks I cannot keep my mouth shut. P tells me my sub-conscious is right.

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There were about 20 of us scattered across the stacking chairs. The Monsignor was a dapper man with a sense of humour. Behind him, many Catholic churches would have a triptych: a richly decorated image of the divine intended to evoke awe. Here there was a picture window. Someone had sensibly concluded that no quantity of paint and imagination was going to match the sight of Blackcomb mountain. As the mass progressed the blue sky darkened and cloud softened and then dissolved the mountain. Snow began to fall. By the time we were exchanging the sign of peace the snow had thinned and the forest around the church was still.

This is the speed a heart should beat.

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For days now I have been teasing P, telling her that I have been too busy to buy her a Valentine’s day gift. This is something of ritual. I always engage in the same pretence so as to ensure a “surprise” for her. So familiar is the pattern that conversation now contains an implicit wink.

Today, after a panicky phone call I discover that a computer error has meant that the gift I ordered will not be arriving until tomorrow. So P really is getting a surprise this year. And I am getting kit-e-kat for dinner.

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