Our joint presentation was at midday. We split the half hour slot equally so that I took the first fifteen minutes and HP the second.

I brushed my hair, put on my green corduroy jacket, picked up my data stick, and set off up the grassy bank to the podium – then swiftly turned around when I realised that I was still in stockinged feet.

Rather than pull on my black boots and make my way back up to the podium, my co-presenter and I abandoned our audience for a short walk over the grass to the sand dunes. Nobody would mind if the session started just a few minutes late, would they? We could always let the session run a few minutes into the lunch break, couldn’t we?

Our problem, however, was that we did not return until five minutes before the end of our slot. No matter how popular we might be as speakers, no audience would tolerate such arrogant behaviour.