What I really feel like doing now is curl up in bed to read.

I’m getting into learning about 16th Century English court via not entirely reliable sources (Philippa Gregory novels) but all the same being more educational than reading, say, Archie comics (which I actually downloaded onto my iPhone).

But, in the interest of self-preservation, I shall not succumb to temptation. Not all the time, anyway, striving perhaps for an optimistic ratio of nine out of 10 times in which I should say “Bugger it all and give me my book.”

No, really. Temptation is evil and should not be yielded to nor employed, except during times when you need to bribe someone into, say, buying you a camera when you already have one but just because you’re greedy and want another one.

In such a case, bribery should offer something of value to your target.

You should discreetly pull him aside and whisper soothingly, even seductively, into his ear: “I will stop drawing funny comics about you if you buy me a new camera.”

And then you hope that he hasn’t yet fulfilled his quota of temptation-yielding for the week and will pick yours.

This has been a public service announcement.

You don’t have to thank me in the event of success in your own similar experiments.