"I'll always regret never having seen the pyramids, because I shot a dog on the outskirts of Cairo ..."

I had made a start on the travel piece I was writing for Sunday paper but kept being distracted from task in hand by ray of sunlight edging its way through tiny chink, which masquerades as a window, in boot cupboard turned office.

Obviously, it was hotting up in the garden, on the other side of chink, whereas in the 6ft cell that is my office, it was dark and cold and hard to get into the spirit of shooting dogs under a glaring Egyptian sun while goose bumps were appearing on my arms.

So, decided to abandon cupboard and take laptop into garden where, I told myself, I would be more inspired to finishing tales of travels in a hot country than sitting in the freezing cold.

Had the person who had shot the dog been floating on a piece of ice on his way to the North Pole, then my office would probably have been the place to stay but as he was causing Arab tempers to flare in a sweltering Cairo suburb, sweltering in the back garden seemed a better bet.

The trouble was the sun was at such a height and strength that wherever I positioned self in garden, I was unable to see screen and was not sure whether my efforts, to describe the opening of windows, shouting and subsequent feeling to Damascus, were being reproduced there.

Eventually, I found that if I lay in the sun, alongside the garden fence, with a cushion between self and laptop it was shaded sufficiently from sun to enable me to see screen.

It also gave me a place on which to rest chin while typing in not wholly comfortable position but at least a position which allowed back to be warmed by sun.

"We'd been driving across the Sahara and had a gun in the back of the van ..." I wrote, before finding while the only position I had managed to find which enabled me to see the screen was uncomfortable for writing, it was fairly conducive to sleeping. I woke when I heard the phone ringing.

It was Lucy, the friend who'd interrupted my working schedule last week to tell that she had a garden designer in her garden, so handsome she needed to confess to having impure thoughts about him.

"Zed's here again," she said - Zed being the man in question. "What are you up to?"

"Trying to write," I told her, with what I hoped was a warning tone in my voice, warning her not to disturb me. I explained to her the heat-seeking scenario, which had resulted in me falling asleep in the sun.

"She told me she was suffering a crisis as the £7,000 Zed had given her for putting in a bit of bedding (whether he was referring to the garden or not I couldn't be sure) had been declared outrageous by Richard the stockbroker husband, who had suggested she dispense with Zed and get her hands dirty herself.

"Outrageous," I said, meaning it was outrageous Richard should suggest she get her hands dirty. "Although seven grand does seem rather a lot when what you really want him for is a sort of escort."

Lucy ended conversation so I tried to find alternative shade for screen. I had just done so when bell rang.

It was Lucy and a tall man who looked well worth paying £7,000 to just to cross your threshold.

"Zed thought he might be able to provide you with shade," said Lucy and they went into the back garden and decided I needed a woven willow arch which would cost several grand, though less if Lucy helped Zed weave, which she seemed keen to do.

"I think maybe I would get more done if I just went inside," I said returning to the boot cupboard ...