Monday

The release of the paperback edition of my last book prompts a quick sweep of the internet for some sort of reaction, and I am immediately reacquainted with my precious collection of one-star reviews, past and present. Even the old ones can still be bracing in their dismay (“Wow … ummm … no”), their dismissiveness (“I didn’t think I would like this and I was right”), or the sheer absence of effort expended (“Not so interesting”).

One way to draw the sting from these rebukes is to find something that disqualifies the reviewer from holding opinions. For example, I don’t accept criticism from people who put a space before a comma instead of after (“Amusing ,in parts”.) or can’t be bothered to spellcheck a five-word review for errors (“Got bore before the end”). By contrast, the occasional stab at fair-mindedness (“Didn’t like it but it was my choice”) can be surprisingly wounding.

The only one that really ever bothered me – from Amazon’s US site – is the one that begins with: “This book made me wish book-burning was a thing.” I long to point out to its author that book-burning is indeed a thing. He went on to heap scorn upon my work with a fury he had only previously expended on a particular model of AC/DC adaptor (“Really sucks”). I shouldn’t have read it, but it was my choice.

Tuesday

I have never been to the Chelsea flower show, probably because my desire to attend was never quite commensurate with the effort required to figure out how I would go about getting in. I always imagined someone would invite me along one day, but no one ever did. Until now.

I was the guest of a cool gardening magazine called Rakesprogress. The main advantage of an evening event is you can see the show after the public have gone home, but I went early so I could see the public. It’s like going to a really big garden centre where the customers dress up.

I can’t claim to be an expert after an hour in the flower people’s company, but at least I now know how to behave: on approaching a garden, one should point in the direction of a specific area of planting and say one of two things: either “I like that very much” or “I’m not at all sure about that”.

There’s probably more to it, but that’s enough to get you through. I also learned that if you have the money it’s possible to buy a lifesize sculpture of a horse made of almost any material – metal, twigs, driftwood, you name it. And that foxgloves are huge right now.

Wednesday

New research demonstrates that Britons really do say thank you more often than anyone, coming top of eight cultures studied. In situations where expressing gratitude is an option, the British deploy thank you 14.5% of the time, whereas Russians say it just 3% of the time, and Cha’palaa speakers of Ecuador never do – their language doesn’t even have a ready translation.

We all know that in Britain it’s possible to say thank you without conveying any gratitude at all, just as “of course” can sometimes mean “sadly, I am not in a position to refuse you”. As an immigrant to these shores, it took me a long time to realise there was no benefit to be derived from understanding these nuances, and that it was better to play dumb and pretend everyone was being nice to me.

Thursday

Reports that a team of scientists will use environmental DNA sampling to look for the Loch Ness monster remind me that while we may have advanced scientifically, we have learned very little. Pioneering techniques are being employed in the search for one of the planet’s oldest surviving hoaxes. Doubting climate change counts as scepticism these days, and yet this is happening.

But the story wasn’t all it seemed. The man leading the scientific team, the New Zealand professor Neil Gemmell, isn’t really on the lookout for Nessie. “I’m going into this thinking it’s unlikely there is a monster,” he says. “But I want to test that hypothesis. What we’ll get is a really nice survey of the biodiversity of Loch Ness.”

It’s not his fault that his forthcoming visit coincides with the release of phone footage captured by an eight-year old girl showing light sparkling on the water in a manner wholly consistent with a giant plesiosaur having a paddle. Last year apparently the highest number of “official” (ie, not official) Nessie sightings were reported in a century. I despair.

Friday

It’s hard to believe it has finally arrived: the last day I will ever receive an unsolicited email from Greater Anglia offering me 20% off a friends and family railcard. There will be no more special deals on replacement dishwasher wheels from Matt @ eSpares. No daily updates from that bicycle shop I visited six years ago. At midnight it all stops, thanks to General Data Protection Regulation.

GDPR may well go down in history as the last nice thing Europe ever got to do for us. I haven’t met anyone who hasn’t throughly enjoyed ignoring weeks of begging emails from companies keen to keep stuffing our inboxes with promotional rubbish.

Over the past fortnight these pleas shifted from impersonally official (“urgent – action required”) to something more desperate, like a late-night text from a hard-to-dump ex. “Is this goodbye, Tim?” said one subject line. “Let’s not part ways now” read another. “Don’t throw our love away” ran a third.

I was tempted to reply saying “It’s not you, it’s me”, but I think a clean break is preferable. We were never really going out in the first place. I just took a ride on one of your trains once, that’s all. I didn’t even enjoy it.

From now on, when I wake up, it’s entirely possible I will have received no emails at all in the night. What a glorious, glorious day.

Digested week digested: Tune in, turn on, opt out.