This compendium will surely provide ‘entertainment for the last 15 minutes of the day’ whatever your inclination: mathematicians can drift off to half a page of pi; motorists might mug up on the Luton, Croydon and Belgravia methods of washing a car; there’s a handy list of people you are not allowed to marry (CofE rules); and for literary types there are the rude bits from Samuel Pepys.