Thing To Do Today: pose.

But surely, you cry, we should not be posing at all. We should be making our way in the world with the frank, trustworthy eyes and modest air which are such a feature of the criminal courts.

Come off it. We are eels, twisting and turning. Even we don't know who we are. The most we can do is take a snapshot: and that will be out-of-date by tea-time.

Oh yes there will be an ocean bed of truth somewhere, but it'll be deep under the buffeting sea of life.

So. What shall we pose as today?

Sane, to start with, I think. Those straws in our hair will just worry people.

Honest. Clever (we'll have to hope no one poses any hard questions). Kind. Funny.

Confident, perhaps, though not too much.

And as we go on we must hope is that our pose will become a habit; and of course if that happens it will have stopped being a pose and become true.

Oh, but that man who phoned earlier, offering to mend your computer?

He really was a poser. Report him at once.

Thing To Do Today: pose. This word comes from the Old French poser, to set in place, from the Late Latin pausāre, to put down or to cease.

The pose which is to do with asking questions comes from the other Late Latin word appōnere, which means to set against.