Last night while riding home into a gloomy, late spring evening, I failed to crack the tough navigational challenge of finding my house. My third year of commuting has been ushered in with barely a whimper after years one and two were at least accorded a hedgehog sized nod. But the event was marked by a failure of muscle memory grooved by 250 return trips and while the autopilot tripped out, I tripped on towards the badlands of Aylesbury.

But for a sudden jerky awareness that my present surroundings were unfamiliar, the termination of the ride would have been exactly that. Thursday night at dusk in the a town populated by a lesser class of boozy thug is not a safe place for anyone without a tatoo or an anger management problem. I would have been killed and eaten and then very possibly charged for the privilege.

I can only put this misjudgement down to one of two things. Either my cognitive functions are already starting to fade or, the terrifying level of concentration I was applying to work related problems means I have started to really care about my job.

Either is a worry, frankly.