Fragments of:

• Broadly approving the new scheme to help readers identify categories of book: in the future each one would be printed in the colour to represent its genre so, for example, a romance would have a red book jacket, the text would be in red, any pictures would be red monochrome, and a big red sticker would be placed on the spine of public library copies of the title; disputing that thrillers should take the colour black.
• Following our dandy host out into the sunshine for a walk; running quickly through the field to avoid the terrorists plotting at the nearby nuclear power station; losing the others in the big house due to slow progress climbing the internal walls of the building; wondering what SL (formerly SC) was doing there; admiring the big staircase in the main entrance hall.
• BP explaining that the submission had actually passed through the review process, in spite of the inappropriate written style; KB lingering in the background in the belief that it would be rude to interrupt two people who were “in love”; denying the accusation, yet admitting that I held affection for BP.