Bill Bryson would be proud of me. As a kind of an homage to middle England's favourite travel writer, the master of the amusing anecdote and retailer of the shrewd insight, I have awoken far too late for our interview, which is to take place on a train bound for Manchester, and must make a frantic dash to Euston station through the teeming streets of London. I run for the Underground, knotting tie with one hand, dropping toothbrush into wastepaper bin en route. I've forgotten my travelcard so I have to sneak through to the Underground, then, at the other end, run across a busy road without observing the Green Cross Code, a manoeuvre enlivened by falling in front of skidding Vauxhall Corsa. I make the platform with two minutes to spare, sweat-glazed, panting like elderly 60-a-day man and deeply, deeply relieved. Wait till I tell Bill about my morning. Hell, it might even make an amusing anecdote for his next book, about, er, growing up in Iowa in the 1950s.
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