I was stood up for lunch the other week. It is not something that happens often, because I am not very forgiving of people who let me down at the last minute when they have promised to eat with me, especially when I invited them. I had booked two shooting lessons at the EJ Churchill Shooting School in West Wycombe, with an hour's break in between. When I phoned, I invited my shooting instructor, the deeply skilled and patient David Leathart, to join me in the pub for lunch in between. In my arrogance I thought he would have been honoured to spend three consecutive hours in my company.

I arrived for the first lesson and discovered that he planned to absent himself from the lunch, because another client was desperate for a lesson and couldn't manage any other time. Initially, I thought how kind he was to give up his break. Then, after my first lesson, I saw the client – female, tall, shapely and younger than me – not difficult to see why he stood me up.