THE BANK HOLIDAY DISCONNECT

I'm not sure about bank holidays. Did they start off being for banks and then everyone else joined in because they couldn't do any business? Now we're all off, all at the same time, cramming into DIY stores, supermarkets and traffic jams.

I'm round at the Intrepids'. We're going on a walk in a bit so I'm just waiting, watching some terrible telly. As you know, I don't have a TV and I don't want one. I want to be disconnected from this murky, manipulative world.

So, here I am wondering what's happened to adverts. I've just seen a man trying to sell insurance by dancing around in high heels, adults talking with children's voices, and some women empowering themselves around a breakfast cereal. Call me old-fashioned but I just don't understand.

Actually, I think advertisers gather round polished tables and conclude that if you can make thousands of people laugh like titillated idiots you can sell them your stuff at twice what it cost you to make it. How offensive.

Anyway, bank holidays. We're off for a trek. If these eight annual, enforced national holidays are for anything, then surely they're for disconnecting from adverts and trash TV and work and stress, and remembering how awesome a thing it is to be together.