Although the purpose of the exercise was unclear, I enjoyed an afternoon of ‘cheese chucking’ with Billy Connolly and BP. The concept was simple. All you had to do was throw lumps of cheese up onto a high shelf. I soon found that the small cellophane-wrapped samples were easy enough to toss, but I cursed the person who had added a huge breeze block sized brick of cheap coloured cheddar to the game. This was impossible to lift, let alone propel through the air.

Afterwards BP challenged E’s decision to make poverty a main theme of her PhD thesis. ‘How could she possibly speak about this with authority at a viva?’ he asked. ‘There simply isn’t time for her to complete all the necessary reading.’