Zelda came out of the kitchen, went into the living room and said, -- Jack Jack Jack.

This was more than she needed to say. Two Jacks more in fact. For on hearing the first Jack, her husband Jack looked up from his newspaper ready to listen to what his wife had to say, so the remaining two Jacks after the first Jack were wasted.

I don't know if anyone has ever worked out how much energy is lost each year by people saying more words than they need to, but I'll bet you a dime to a dollar that if all the energy expended on those superfluous words was collected and turned into electricity there would be enough power to provide a small town with heat and light for a month, maybe two.

Zelda repeated the word Jack three times because she was distraught and when we are distraught we tend to say more than we need to, although some people say nothing at all, struck dumb with distraughtness.

Zelda was distraught because the kettle she had been boiling to make coffee had boiled dry and now had a buckled bottom. Obviously she hadn't actually been boiling the kettle, she had been heating the kettle to boil the water inside, but the water had evaporated which left the kettle empty which meant the kettle overheated and the bottom buckled.

The reason Zelda had allowed the kettle to boil dry, even though she had been in the kitchen supposedly making coffee, had its origins earlier in the day. That morning she had gone into a second- hand bookshop, just to browse rather than to look for anything specific, and while there she had admired, and then bought, a very handsome calf-bound edition of Austin Dobson's 18th century vignettes.

At home in the kitchen she had taken the book out of its bag and noticed a few scuff marks she hadn't seen in the bookshop, probably because in the bookshop it was dark, and her kitchen was bright with the afternoon sun.

Zelda, who was meticulous about appearances, thought the book would be improved with a gentle polish, so she searched the cupboards to find shoe polish the same colour as the book. She had never heard of anyone polishing a book but she didn't see why it shouldn't be a good thing to do.

It was while she was polishing the book that she heard the kettle go bonk, and that was when she ran through to the living room and said, Jack Jack Jack.

Jack, attentive after the first Jack, said, -- Oh dear oh dear.
And the second oh dear meant his question, -- What happened? was a split-second later than it needed to be.

Now, when you think about it, if we added together all the split-seconds we wasted each day repeating what we have already said we could easily have an extra five or six minutes each month, and when you consider that in five minutes you can bump into someone good-looking and, while you apologise, get invited for a coffee, or buy a plane ticket to a foreign part you have always wanted to visit, or meet someone you haven't seen since school, or even fall in love, you can see that saving those split seconds can be life changing.

--The kettle boiled dry, answered Zelda to Jack’s sensible question, and Jack got up from his chair.

--Oh dear, he said again, but as this was said while he crossed the room it didn't delay him and therefore cannot be considered as wasted, although the energy expended could have been useful for the small town I mentioned earlier.

He switched off the gas which Zelda in her distraughtness had forgotten to do.

--Why did you let the kettle boil dry?
--I was polishing a book.
--Polishing a book?
--Yes. See.
--Oh, it's Dobson's 18th-century vignettes.
--I got it for you but it was a bit scuff…

Before Zelda could finish Jack kissed her, which meant the ed from the word scuffed was saved and would compensate for half of a Jack she had wasted earlier.

Zelda embraced him and warmed to his kiss, and together they left the kitchen, walked through the living room of wasted words, not thinking in letters but in images of their bodies entwining, and went into the bedroom and closed the door.

I know what they said and did there, but I'm a firm believer that what lovers do in the privacy of their bedroom should stay private. Although I will say there were enough wasted ooos and aaas to keep a light bulb shining all evening, if you wanted it to.