Now I'm no biologist, but it seems to make a lot of sense that slow lives, as well as being enjoyable, are long lives. One only has to think of the example of the tortoise for proof of this theory from the animal world.

Long weekends at festivals, short weeks at home, all summer long: now that is surely preferable to the immense cost and headache of the nuclear family holiday in the sun?

Poetry, being supremely useless, by its very existence represents a protest against the so-called 'real world' of busy-ness and moneymaking, so we must embrace, salute and support our poets.

Working is bad enough in the winter, but in the summer it can become completely intolerable. Stuck in airless offices, every fibre of our being seems to cry out for freedom. We're reminded of being stuck in double maths while the birds sing outside.

As I make my slow pilgrimage through the world, a certain sense of beautiful mystery seems to gather and grow.

He has to be aggressive and be slow, if that makes any sense. He's gotta do that. Because when he does, he sees the court so much better. He has improved his passing so much this year. He's seeing things a little better, instead of it being a blur - because he's so quick that it is a blur sometimes.