My Sunday lunch with George Michael

All is grist that comes to a columnist’s mill. The late Alan Coren once wrote that if he heard a screech of tyres in the road outside his house, he rushed out, notebook in hand, ‘because you never know where the next 300 words are coming from’. I find that the Anniversary Almanac can be a reliable source of copy during thin times; my particular favourites being 40th, 50th and 60th anniversaries because they’re all potentially still in living memory. I’m already eyeing up anniversary options for 2023. And here’s an early heads-up – expect a deluge of words to mark the 60th anniversary of JFK’s assassination. Just as everyone remembers where they were when they heard Princess Diana had died, so those who were sentient on 22 November 1963 can recall the exact moment they learned of the president’s death.

For some, it was career-defining, as in the case of a London newspaper editor I once worked for, Bob Hutchings.