In the Telegraph, Dalrymple takes the news of Sir Alex Ferguson’s announcement of retirement as an opportunity to muse on retirement generally, including his own:
There are few sensations more delightful than waking up in the morning in the knowledge that one does not have to get up if one doesn’t want to. No doubt it is a sign of mankind’s bad character that the sensation is all the more delicious because one knows that not everyone can share it. And one comes to realise that the old maiden aunt who took an entire morning to post a letter, whom Northcote Parkinson described to illustrate his famous law that work expands to meet the time available for its completion, was not so much a figure of fun or even obloquy as a wise old bird. The fact is that pottering is fun and soothes the soul.