I had a moment of intense middle-aged horror just before I went on my summer holiday. I was packing my suitcase and reached for my lovely biscuity-coloured linen suit. I ponce about it on balmy evenings overseas imagining I’m Graham Greene. My wife forbids me from wearing a hat with it on pain of divorce.

The suit, though, didn’t fit anymore. I stared at myself with hatred in the mirror whispering: ‘What have you done, you fat b*****d?’ It cost a fortune and now I’ve blobbed out so much I’ll never get into it again.

Still, two weeks of delicious booze and three-course meals somewhat soothed the suit-pain.

The day after I returned from holiday, a knock came to the door. I answered it and a guy was standing there who looked familiar. I couldn’t quite place him. ‘Yes?’ I said.

‘It’s me, you twat,’ the guy replied. ‘Conor.’ I’ve known my friend Conor for years, but we hadn’t caught up in a few months. The last time I’d seen him, he - like me - was in the process of watching his middle-aged spread keep spreading, like a map of the plague inching across medieval Europe.

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But here he was - skinny. Not just skinny. This monster looked handsome again. Hot even, for pity’s sake.

‘What in the name of levelling-up has happened to you?’ I asked. Fat-jabs, he replied. I experienced the most indescribable sense of jealously.........

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