The abbey library of Maria Laach in Germany

I had 7 bookcases in my house at one point. I worked out that if each book was worth on average £10, then 10 books was worth £100. This was 30 years ago. 10 books doesn't take a lot of space, so, no wonder I never had any money.

The bird spotters get the twitches when they see a rare bird, and I used to get something similar when I spotted a great new book.

Some people can only get excited when are doing some sort of daredevil act, like hanging off the side of a mountain, the sort of thrill I would get evertime I saw a new edition of What Hi-Fi up on the newsagent's shelf.

Anyway, I should have become a librarian as I was never cut out for engineering.

The abbey library of Maria Laach in Germany