No chance, then, that we'll ever see astronauts telling us the ugly truth about life among the stars: "Bloody boring up here: space toilet's broken and now the computer's playing up."

Ever since then I have been paying special attention to how people communicate their new addresses and have now decided to write a 'how to' about the subject.

Ever since, it has borne a whiff of consumerist self-indulgence, and its advocates then and now are accused of prizing sensation over anything more profound or ostensibly value-laden.