I have never been a cigarette smoker. Come to that, I’ve never been a smoker of anything. I got through school and university without taking it up and after that the idea seemed rather pointless. Mr M, too, has never smoked – as a fanatical Australian sportsman he eschewed cigarettes in favour of greater lung capacity, and believed smoking was a pastime only for the foolish.

The foolish, it turns out, include his eldest son. Cost centre #1 outed himself as a “social smoker” a little while ago. We immediately enforced a 25 per cent cut in his allowance and made it abundantly clear that we wished him to give up. To no avail – I resigned myself to having a smoker in the family and resolved to try harder with CC#2.