I had to travel from Birmingham to London to check out the venue for the following day’s conference. While the others piled into cars and minibuses, I wandered around the car park regretting that I had not arranged a lift. Now I felt like an unwanted hitchhiker, hopelessly trying to identify someone who had room for me in a vehicle heading south. I really would have liked to have joined AC and her friends in the open top MG7 but everyone, including Belle, pretended that they didn’t know me.

When I eventually realised that I wouldn’t make it to London that afternoon I decided to make the most of the extra time available to finish a couple of reports and a PowerPoint presentation for work. To get me through this I needed chocolate, so I hunted down the campus sweet shop.

On my way there I was distracted by the committee of the Edinburgh Folk Club. Apparently I was a highly sought-after potential member. Then – even better – along the street came the World Cup winning England football team. I whipped out my iPhone to photograph our national heroes as they marched past.