For anyone of a rational disposition, fashion is often nearly impossible to fathom. Throughout many periods of history – perhaps most – it can seem as if the whole impulse of fashion has been to look maximally ridiculous. If one could be maximally uncomfortable as well, the triumph was all the greater.

I really enjoy going to a library and spending the day doing research - to me that is the most pleasurable part of writing the science book.

I wanted to quit and to do this forever, sleep in a bed and in a tent, see what was over the next hill and never see a hill again. All of this all at once, every moment, on the trail or off.

I see litter as part of a long continuum of anti-social behaviour.

Because time moves more slowly in Kid World ... it goes on for decades ... It is adult life that is over in a twinkling.

I refer of course to the soaring wonder of the age known as the Eiffel Tower. Never in history has a structure been more technologically advanced, materially obsolescent, and gloriously pointless all at the same time.

Most big companies don't like you very much, except hotels, airlines and Microsoft, which don't like you at all.