So here’s the thing: I can’t say too much about myself because I need to keep my real identity quiet. The problem is that my novelised memoir, The Best Nuisance I Can Be, tells the mostly-true stories of people I knew back in the 1980s. Maybe no one cares what happened so long ago, but I felt obliged to protect their privacy. I spent a long time anonymising the book, and making myself identifiable would subvert that.

Given all that, it may seem downright dopey to include a photo. However, I’ve picked one where cap and sunglasses occupy a lot of facial real estate, and in any case, I look nothing like my twenty-something self. Unfortunately.

• Primate
• Bipedal
• Sub-species homo sapiens sapiens
• Male
• Disgorged from maternal love tunnel in 1960s
• Heterosexual, but also attracted to wasps

• Raised in beautiful West Bromwich.
• Escaped WB at uni, learned as much as possible, stayed young and silly, avoided a career.
• Travelled.
• Had a career. Years of stressful work.
• Redundancy. New job fell from heaven.
• Writing for money. Fabulous boss.
• Became old and silly.

• Things that interest me: history, literature, film, art, lifting weights, guitar, philosophy, politics, science, thinking.
• Things that don’t interest me: alcohol, sport, celebrities, FOMO, social media, how your kids are getting on now.
• Things that irritate me: an almost infinite list, from which I’ll pick ‘bold re-imaginings’ of classics and vocal fry.
• Things I really hate: litterers. When I’m declared king, they’ll be turned into cattle feed.
• Things that I love: eating, making honking noises, making up stupid songs, unexpected glimpses of breasts in old films, my pen name (but not my real name).
• Things that I avoid: small children, gatherings of over eight people.
• Positive characteristics: I’m quite generous. I spoil this by pointing out that I’m quite generous.
• Negative characteristics: I’m not telling you.

Still, if you’d like to know what my favourite pelagic fish is, or what have you, contact philipcliveminty@proton.me

There’s nothing down here, just the footer, and that’s rubbish.