Who said men can’t multi – task ? On the eve of the Tories’ conference, one of them confessed that not only could he represent his constituents, but could also send inappropriate pics of himself to an under-cover reporter posing as something else entirely. Would he have done that without social media ? Probably not. He’d’ve had to have take pics of himself in a mirror, get the film processed at Boots [providing it wasn’t TOO rude], bunged the prints in an envelope, found a stamp and trusted Royal Mail. No need for all that palaver these days. Now, you can get yourself into a whole world of trouble simply by pressing a few buttons.

We all multi- task. Always have done. Most of it happens in our heads. We know what needs to be done. We have mental lists. We even make real lists. We get a sense of achievement from making the real list. It shows that we’re on top of our game. At the end of the week, do all the items have a “done” tick? No, because in the interim, other stuff has happened, so we make another list. Presently, I’m about three years behind and I’ve got lots of lists.

There’s an exciting item on this week’s list. For my birthday, Sheila bought me a ride on the footplate of a real steam locomotive. I really like steam locos. I wish I’d taken more notice of them when I was a kid. I’m full of admiration for the dedicated people who resurrect railway lines and old engines. Anyway, one of the conditions of the hour long trip is that you have to wear overalls and steel toe capped boots . So I bought some. The result is…………well, “pillock” comes to mind. But I don’t care.

A bit more daunting is the fact that I’m now Chairperson of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation, which is a bit like saying, I am the leader of this large group of free-thinking cats. PCO cartoonists are all clever, funny, out-of-the-box thinkers. They have to be. Anyway, there’s a Committee meeting down in London at the end of October. Its bound to be enjoyable and funny, but whether we tick all the items on our list as “Done” remains to be seen.