I would like to congratulate the person who prepared the small cheese roll I bought in W H Smith at Manchester Piccadilly Station recently. They somehow managed to balance a standard cheese slice on one of its edges (or possibly gripped it in a vice) and slice it in half downwards. Then they put about 1mg of butter margarine in their mouth, swilled it around and licked one half of the inside of the roll very, very quickly. Then, after carefully but expertly shaping and positioning the cheese so that none of it showed from the outside (so you couldn’t see how little there was), they stuck a price ticket on it (£3.99) which made me laugh, until I had to fork out the equivalent sum because (a) I was hungry and (b) I have to be careful what I stuff my dodgy insides with these days when I’m due to embark on a longish journey.

A masterpiece of retail skulduggery; I reckon the boss of W H Smug and Sons drives a beaten up old yellow Robin Reliant.